EUPORIAS Deliverable 33.2: Report summarising review of existing approaches for communicating confidence levels (original) (raw)

EUPORIAS Deliverable 33.2: Report summarising review of existing approaches for communicating confidence levels

This report presents a review of the literature concerning approaches to communicating confidence and uncertainty, with the objective of informing best practice in seasonal-to-decadal climate predictions. As issues pertaining to the communication of uncertainty transcend disciplinary boundaries this review draws upon research conducted in a range of fields, including: weather, climate policy, health and medicine, environmental risk management, economics, experimental psychology, and engineering. The review highlights a number of factors that are likely to impact on end-users’ interpretation and usage of information concerning confidence and uncertainty in seasonal-to-decadal climate and climate impact predictions. These include: ambiguity aversion, trust in information providers, institutional protocol, technical expertise, level of precision, the type of visualisation tool(s) used, and systematic thought biases. Methods of presenting uncertainty information in numeric, verbal and v...