“The Less people know, the Less they want to know”

This seems to make sense:

WATERLOO, Ontario, Nov. 23 (UPI) — The less people know about complex issues such as the economy, energy and the environment, the less they want to know, Canadian researchers found.

Study author Steven Shepherd, a graduate student with the University of Waterloo in Ontario, said researchers found the more urgent the issue, the more people want to remain unaware.

“These studies were designed to help understand the so-called ‘ignorance is bliss’ approach to social issues,” Shepherd said in a statement. A series of five studies were conducted in 2010 and 2011 with 511 adults in the United States and Canada.

Participants who felt most affected by the economic recession avoided information challenging the government’s ability to manage the economy. However, they did not avoid positive information, the study said.

The study participants who received the complex description indicated higher levels of perceived helplessness in getting through the economic downturn, more dependence on and trust in the government to manage the economy and less desire to learn more about the issue, Shepherd said.

“People tend to respond by psychologically ‘outsourcing’ the issue to the government, which in turn causes them to trust and feel more dependent on the government,” said study co-author Aaron C. Kay of Duke University. “Ultimately, they avoid learning about the issue because that could shatter their faith in the government.”

The findings were published online in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.

The item doesn’t mention ‘climate change’ but it hardly has to.  Even as the consequences become ever more evident, there’s less interest in taking what Canada is doing seriously.

The moral dilemma is unavoidable, though: we keep ourselves rich and comfortable by digging up and shipping all our condensed greenhouse gases – coal, oil, natural gas – to other places to be burned.  And now it’s clear we’re abandoning any international treaties or constraints as we accelerate the push to exp0it the tar sands.  What’s our responsibility when that alone may be enough to shift the climate into the danger zone?