Introduction. Climate Change Discourse: Re-mediation and Re-contextualisation in News and Social Media

As public debate over climate change and environmental issues has greatly intensified over the years, a number of studies have pointed out that citizens’ awareness, attitudes, and actions towards climate change are shaped by mediated information. News media play a pivotal role in the popularization of climate science and scientific evaluations. Yet, bridging the gap between experts and laypeople may be extremely difficult in the case of ‘contested science’ such as climate change. Scientists adopt non- persuasive communication, trusting data to speak for itself, and describe findings in ways that respond to the complexity of the phenomena under observation.