There sure has been a lot of talk about climate change, sustainability, green this and green that lately. But how much of the talk will lead to action? Not much, suggests one new study, unless it sends people on a good old-fashioned guilt trip.

The research, a joint-effort by two behavioral psychologists, found that people are less likely to feel responsible for mass disasters, like the polar ice caps melting or a scorched Earth in a few decades, than they are for less cataclysmic, more local potential effects of global warming. Such a counter-intuitive reaction could provide a clue into how to best motivate people to change their behavior now to stem such disasters later.

What does this mean? Like other alarmist campaigns -- anti-drug and smoking ads, or the war on obesity ads depicting soft drinks that morph into gelatinous fat -- the new onslaught of scare tactics about global warming may do nothing to change the way we operate.

But, tell your friend that failing to recycle that used milk carton could give his grandkids typhus, and he just might do it. One step at a time, right?

[Image: Weegee]