- US respondents tend to rate both warming and cooling events less extreme when the events occur in regions associated with their political party.

- This effect is especially pronounced for cooling events happening in Democrat-associated regions and warming events happening in Republican-associated regions.

- We do not find evidence that people are generally more sensitive to climate anomalies in their own region; however, Democrats rate cooling events more extreme in regions they themselves inhabit.

Abstract

Perceptions of climate anomalies shape climate policy and action, but can also be influenced by social and political factors, such as political ideology. Existing work suggests ideological biases may cause individuals to perceive climate change as less severe or occurring at a slower rate than the scientific consensus. However, these studies have typically focused on perceptions of climate change more generally, rather than perceptions of specific climate events or anomalies. We build on this work by investigating the relationship between political ideology and perceptions of temperature anomalies across individual US counties, as measured by user-generated social media posts. Using a difference-in-differences design, we find that US respondents tend to rate both unusually warm and unusually cool temperatures as less extreme when those temperatures occur in counties associated with their political party. This effect is especially pronounced for cooling events happening in Democratic-associated counties and warming events happening in Republican-associated counties. Our results suggest that social or political identities and preferences could bias an individual’s perception of specific extreme weather events and have implications for the social amplification or attenuation of these events.