summary: Warmer temperatures lead to simpler language in parliamentary speeches, and researchers analyzed 7 million speeches from 28,000 politicians and found that heat negatively impacts cognitive performance.
The effect was more pronounced among older politicians. The findings highlight the broader implications of climate change on human performance and decision-making.
Key Facts:
- As the weather gets warmer, politicians’ speeches become easier to deliver.
- The study analyzed seven million speeches from 28,000 politicians around the world.
- Older politicians were more affected by the high temperatures.
sauce: Cell Press
Climate change has far-reaching and complex effects on human and planetary well-being. iScience On June 13th, something surprising was added to the list.
An analysis of the language used in seven million parliamentary speeches around the world found that rising temperatures are associated with a significant and immediate decrease in the complexity of politicians’ language.
The findings suggest that rising temperatures may have real and immediate effects on our cognitive abilities, the researchers say. The study also demonstrates an innovative use of computational methods combining automated text analysis and global weather data to assess the broader impacts of climate change on human health and performance.
“Heat has long been associated with a variety of negative health effects, including increased risk of declines in productivity and cognitive performance,” said Risto Conte-Kawab of the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research in Rostock, Germany.
“Our study highlights that this phenomenon extends to politicians who bear significant responsibilities.”
“Specifically, we find that rising temperatures decrease the complexity of the language used in parliamentary speeches in eight countries,” says Tobias Widman of Aarhus University in Denmark.
“This suggests that heat can have a negative impact on cognitive function, even in professional environments where precise and complex language is important.”
Comte-Keibab and Widmann made their discovery by collecting millions of parliamentary speeches, a collection that includes speeches from more than 28,000 politicians in eight countries spanning several decades.
To explore the link between the language of those speeches and precise daily temperatures and weather, the researchers employed a modeling strategy that harnessed seemingly random daily temperature fluctuations to analyze their effects.
The researchers explain that this approach allowed them to isolate the effect of temperature on politicians’ linguistic complexity, with surprisingly clear results. Their findings showed that hot days reduced linguistic complexity; cold days had no similar effect. To learn more, the researchers also looked more closely at the different effects based on age and gender in Germany.
“A surprising finding was that in Germany the effect is larger for older politicians compared to younger politicians,” says Conte-Kawab.
“This result is not only interesting in itself, but also increases our confidence in the study’s findings. It makes sense that older people would be more susceptible to the effects of extreme temperatures, which is consistent with our observations and highlights the robustness of our conclusions.”
The researchers say their findings provide new evidence that human behavior is influenced not only by strategic considerations but also by environmental factors.
“Simplifying political discourse has complex implications: simpler language may increase public understanding and engagement, but it may also signal reduced cognitive abilities due to the heat,” Widman said.
“This could have a negative impact on MPs’ productivity and affect legislative decision-making, public representation and budget planning.”
“Given the important role that politicians play in the democratic process, the effects of extreme temperatures on their cognitive abilities could have profound and far-reaching implications for society as a whole.”
The researchers say future studies could dig deeper into how extreme temperatures affect politicians’ overall productivity and performance, and indeed their legislative decision-making. Managing these effects is essential to mitigating the impact of climate change on democratic processes and governance.
About this Communication and Political Neuroscience Research News
author: Christopher Behnke
sauce: Cell Press
contact: Christopher Behnke – Cell Press
image: Image courtesy of Neuroscience News
Original Research: The survey results are iScience
