Will people really fly less because of a word like “flight shame”?
“Climate crisis”, “greenwashing” and “flight shame”: new words are constantly popping up around climate change. These words show how people think, research by the University of Amsterdam and the Rijksuniversiteit Groningen shows, and that can lead to behavioural change.
Once again, the Dutch aviation sector has broken a record in greenhouse gas emissions, at 3.1 megatonnes of CO₂. In 2024, the sector emitted 1.4 megatons more CO₂ than the year before. You might conclude that the word “flight shame”, which was included in the 2018 edition of the Van Dale dictionary, seems to have at most a negative effect.
Yet words like “flight shame” can ultimately lead to behavioural change, according to Jan Willem Bolderdijk, professor of sustainability and marketing at the University of Amsterdam. He investigates why good intentions do not always result in sustainable actions. Together with PhD student Greta Zella, a linguist at the University of Groningen, he describes in a scientific article how certain words such as “flight shame”, “greenwashing” and “climate crisis” contribute to social tipping points.
How new is research into the effect of new words on climate change?
Zella: “It is quite new. In linguistics, a lot was known about what words can achieve, but it has not been extensively applied to climate change. There is a relatively new branch in linguistics: ecolinguistics, which focuses specifically on the impact that language has on the way people perceive the environment. We have now also brought this together with environmental psychology.”
Bolderdijk: “In environmental psychology, there is a lot of research into communication, how to get a message across to achieve the desired result. But the idea that the introduction of a new word can have all kinds of cognitive and social effects was new to me.”
How can words contribute to behavioural change?
Zella: “Firstly, it is important to name a new phenomenon. It’s not like you can’t experience or perceive a phenomenon without a name, but if you have a word for something, it creates awareness and you can communicate about it more efficiently.”
Bolderdijk: “Before people knew the word ‘flight shame’, some did have an uneasy feeling that flying is harmful to the environment, but it was difficult to put into words. Talking is important because you then realise that other people feel the same way. People systematically underestimate how many people actually agree with them. We call this pluralistic ignorance. There are good examples of this in the US, for example 70 percent of the American population is in favour of climate policy, while people think that only 40 percent of the population supports climate policy.
“People are social creatures. If you think you are the only one who is concerned, then you don’t talk about it. But if you want to change society, then you should talk about it. That gives politicians and policymakers a sign that there is support for it.”
Yet the Dutch are not yet demonstrating climate-friendly behaviour. Take the new record in emissions from the Dutch aviation sector.
Bolderdijk: “We can’t change everything with words, we have to be realistic about that. But you can’t deduce how people feel about a subject based on just their behaviour. According to a representative survey by the Ministry of Economic Affairs & Climate Policy, a ‘silent majority of Dutch citizens support a ban on all flights under 620 kilometres and want to improve international train connections.”
“These emission figures and airline advertisements make it seem as if all Dutch people love flying and couldn’t care less about the climate, but that is a far too simplistic view. Many people do fly but feel uncomfortable about it. Thanks to the term ‘flight shame’, we can get a more nuanced picture. Emissions are also unevenly distributed across the Netherlands: there are a number of people who fly a lot, some people who fly annually and some who don’t fly at all.”
“And if you want to reach a social tipping point where change will reinforce itself, it is important that people start talking. Before actions change, people’s attitudes must change first. It seems hypocritical to fly with flying shame, but you can also see it this way: that the system has not yet caught up with the new attitudes. So in some cases, words say more than our actions.”
Which word in climate change will become the new hype?
Zella: “That’s difficult to predict. From the perspective of linguistics, linguistic transparency can be a good predictor, that is to say words whose meaning is easy to grasp at first sight, as in the case of ‘flight shame’. But many other non-linguistic factors also play a crucial role, if a famous person uses the word, that might help it spread.”
Bolderdijk: “I do have an example of a word that didn’t make it. During my inaugural speech as a professor, I tried to introduce the word – and now I have to think for a moment, which is a bad sign – “hypo...”, no “hypocritical”. I wanted to use it to describe the phenomenon in which someone who sticks his neck out for the climate out of moral considerations is criticised for inconsistency in their actions. Like a climate activist who receives a ton of criticism because they go on a skiing holiday. But that word, hypocritical, didn’t catch on in the end.”
Maybe it was too complicated?
Bolderdijk: “That could be, but complicated words – which you don’t understand at first glance – often stick in your mind better. Because you have to think about them first.”
Zella: “Transparent words are more likely to succeed, but less transparent words do indeed tend to consciously stick in your mind and be recognized as new.”
Have you started using certain words more yourselves?
Bolderdijk: “No, not one word. But I have become more aware of the power of words. They influence how we think, talk and how we operate in groups.”
Zella: “I have noticed the same thing. And I now think twice about which word I use.”
