Karen McNeal

Area(s) of Expertise

My teaching/research interests are in geoscience education and geocognition where I explore questions concerning human understanding of earth systems. My current work ties together the affective and cognitive domains of learning through both qualitative and quantitative methods in the context of climate change phenomena. Specifically, I am interested in measuring participant psychomotor (e.g., eye-tracking and skin conductance) responses to climate information communicated through various pathways (e.g., static and dynamic text and visuals) in order to bring insights to best practices that attract attention and engagement, address expert-novice gaps, and provide appropriate scaffolding to support understanding among a range of audiences. I am also interested in understanding the role of participant attitude and the cultural and ideological factors that might influence how people interpret and engage with such climate change information.