University of Washington Invited Prof. Shih to Talk on Contemporary Environmental Issues in Taiwan

Taiwan Studies Program of the University of Washington (UW) organized a virtual talk titled "Winter 2021 Lecture Series: Contemporary Environment Issues in Taiwan" on 25th February 2021. Tsung-Jen Shih, associate professor from International Master's Program in International Communication Studies (IMICS) at National Chengchi University (NCCU), was invited and delivered a speech titled "Public Opinion and Behavior towards Climate Change in Taiwan" via Zoom.

Prof. Shih's areas of expertise are science communication, public opinion research, and cross-cultural comparative research. He had also published an article titled "Climate Change Communication in Hong Kong and Taiwan" on Oxford University Press. During the two hours talk, prof Shih demonstrated his research finding and joined the discussion room to have an in-depth discussion with students from UW. IMICS students were invited to share their experience in Taiwan.

“I was interested in joining the talk because East Asia is set to have a more profound impact on climate change than any other region, and I appreciate prof. Shih’s insight about public opinions and attitudes regarding climate change and how it breaks down along various demographics,” said Ryan Mohandeson, a student from UW.

Prof. Shih presents his research findings during the talk.

“It is interesting to get a whole new aspect about Taiwan and environmental issues from the professor and students from NCCU,” said Taylor Welch, a UW student. Both Ryan and Taylor mentioned that they hope to visit Taiwan in the future after the Covid-19 pandemic.

Yu-Ting, Chen, a second-year student from IMICS, shared that this talk reminded her about the importance of finding a new perspective to communicate in environmental issues to avoid decreasing urgency by being overexposed, discussed in the Controversial Science course lectured by Prof. Shih last semester. “After the discussion with students from UW, I found that it is interesting to see how people’s attitudes towards the environment are based on different cultural backgrounds,” said Yu-Ting.

“The talk made me think about what humans have done to the environment. It inspired me to research the negative emotion that causes the decrease of urgency towards environmental issues mentioned in the talk,” said Yun-Chung, Tang, PhD student from NCCU.

The coordinator, Dr. Lin and Prof. Shih are having Q&A sessions for the participants.

The Taiwan Studies Program at UW was established in 2017 to promote research and education on Taiwan society and culture.

Author: Tracy Mai (IMICS 109)