“Climate change is a threat to human well-being and planetary health. There is a rapidly closing window of opportunity to secure a liveable and sustainable future for all.”
— Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, 2023
My research program integrates social psychological theory with large-scale behavioral science methods to identify, test, and translate effective strategies for motivating collective action on climate change. I address a core challenge in social psychology: how to change beliefs and behaviors in politically polarized, emotionally charged, and globally diverse contexts.
I started my Ph.D. at NYU in 2022, supported by a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship. I am a member of Dr. Jay Van Bavel's Center for Conflict and Cooperation at NYU and Dr. Madalina Vlasceanu's Climate Cognition Lab at Stanford.
Learn more about my experience on my CV.
My research aims to identify effective strategies for motivating meaningful, large-scale action on climate change.
Belief Is Not Behavior
Much of my work is driven by a simple but often overlooked insight: believing in climate change doesn’t always lead to action, and disbelief doesn’t always mean inaction. In a global study spanning more than 60 countries, we found that political ideology predicts climate belief and policy support, but not necessarily behavior. Conservatives who reject climate change may still engage in pro-environmental behaviors, while liberals who express strong concern often fall short in taking action. This belief-behavior disconnect reveals both risk and opportunity: climate interventions can misfire if they only aim to persuade, but they can succeed if they tap into motivations beyond belief. I use this insight in my work to rethink how we design and evaluate climate communications, moving beyond attitude change to behavioral leverage points.
Designing Interventions That Work
To identify what actually shifts climate behavior, I lead large-scale “megastudies” that test many interventions simultaneously in diverse populations. In a U.S.-based study with over 30,000 participants, we evaluated 17 theoretically grounded messages designed to increase public, political, and financial advocacy. The most effective intervention overall emphasized collective efficacy and emotional benefits, and appeals to binding moral values (e.g., purity, sanctity) drove financial climate action even among Republicans.
In other work, we found that messages simultaneously evoking various negative and positive emotional responses were most effective in driving advocacy.
Effective interventions are rarely universal. They must resonate with different audiences’ identities, values, and emotions. My ongoing work focuses on refining these strategies and translating them into applied settings: from student advocacy campaigns in Cambridge to congestion pricing support in NYC.
What Builds Support for Systemic Change
Behavioral science often focuses on nudging individuals, but many of the most impactful climate solutions require collective or institutional change. I study how to motivate support for these higher-level shifts, especially in politically polarized contexts. One key driver is efficacy: people are more likely to act when they believe their actions matter. But efficacy comes in different forms. While most research focuses on personal or collective efficacy, we’ve found that governmental efficacy, the belief that institutions can and will respond effectively, is a critical and understudied predictor of climate advocacy. In recent work, we show that governmental efficacy not only increases support for action, but may also help bridge the partisan divide.
At the same time, I’ve investigated common pitfalls in well-meaning interventions. For example, in one study correcting people’s misperceptions about which lifestyle behaviors are most climate-effective, we found that participants became more accurate, but also less willing to engage in collective action like voting or protesting. These spillover effects underscore the importance of aligning individual- and systems-level messaging.
Making Climate Action Stick
Across these lines of work, I aim to develop strategies are both persuasive and durable. This means grounding interventions in theory, testing them at scale, and partnering with real-world organizations to deploy them in high-impact settings. My ultimate goal is to help build a public that is mobilized for a more livable future.
SELECTED RESEARCH PRESENTATIONS
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2025 - Society for Personality and Social Psychology (SPSP) Annual Convention (Denver, CO)
Symposium Talk: Goldwert, D., Constantino, S. M., ... & Vlasceanu, M. Behavioral Interventions for Collective Climate Action.
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2024 - Society for Personality and Social Psychology (SPSP) Annual Convention (San Diego, CA)
Symposium Talk: Goldwert, D., Berkebile-Weinberg, M., Doell, K., Van Bavel, J. J., & Vlasceanu, M. The Differential Impact of Climate Interventions along the Political Divide.
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2023 - International Conference on Environmental Psychology (ICEP) (Aarhus, Denmark)
Symposium Talk: Goldwert, D., Doell, K., Van Bavel, J. J., Grayson, S., & Vlasceanu, M. Cultural Individualism/Collectivism Moderates the Effects of Climate Action Interventions.
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2023 - NYU Psychology Department Social Speaker Series
Talk: Goldwert, D., Berkebile-Weinberg, M., Doell, K., Van Bavel, J. J., & Vlasceanu, M. Political Ideology Differences in Responses to Climate Action Interventions.
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2023 - Association for Psychological Science (APS) Annual Convention (Washington D.C.)
Poster Presentation: Goldwert, D., Doell, K., Van Bavel, J. J., Grayson, S., & Vlasceanu, M. The Impact of Cultural Values on the Effectiveness of Climate Change Interventions.
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2023 - Society for Personality and Social Psychology (SPSP) Annual Convention (Atlanta, GA)
Poster Presentation: Goldwert, D., Doell, K., Van Bavel, J., Grayson, S., & Vlasceanu, M. How should you be referring to the climate crisis for higher impact?
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2022 - Society for Personality and Social Psychology (SPSP) Annual Convention (San Francisco, CA)
Poster Presentation: Goldwert, D., Broos, H., Dev, A., Broad, & Timpano, K. R. Understanding the role of individual difference factors in shaping information processing and emotional responses to climate change messaging
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2021 - University of Miami 13th Annual Research, Creativity, and Innovation Forum (Coral Gables, FL)
Poster Presentation: Goldwert, D., Broos, H., Dev, A., Broad, & Timpano, K. R. The Impact of Intolerance of Uncertainty and Climate Change Anxiety on Climate Change Engagement and Distress.
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2021 - Society for Personality and Social Psychology (SPSP) Annual Convention
Poster Presentation: Goldwert, D., Broad, K., Clement, A. C., & Timpano, K. R. Climate change concerns following a hurricane correspond to worry due to the storm but not general worry or tangible hardships.
Research EXPERIENCE
COLLECTIVE COGNITION )
Member, Stanford Climate Cognition Lab
PI: Dr. Madalina Vlasceanu
2019)
Visiting Researcher, Cambridge Social Decision-Making Lab
PI: Dr. Sander van der Linden
COLLECTIVE PRESENT)
Member, NYU Social Identity & Morality Lab
PI: Dr. Jay Van Bavel
BEHAVIORAL SCIENCE FOR POLICY LAB (2021 - 202
Research Specialist, Princeton Behavioral Science for Policy Lab
PI: Dr. Elke U. Weber
PROGRAM FOR ANXIET)
Research Assistant, UM Program for Anxiety, Stress, & OCD
PI: Dr. Kiara Timpano
COLUMBIA COUPLES LAB (
Research Intern, Columbia Couples Lab
PI: Dr. Niall Bolger
