A new paper co-written by a University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign urban and environmental economics expert shows that social networks can play a significant role in influencing the financial behaviors and perception of catastrophic risks brought about by climate change.

New research from Yilan Xu, a professor in the Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics (ACE), found that short but severe episodes of flooding from hurricanes in Texas and Florida triggered an increase in flood insurance sign-ups nationwide depending on how socially connected a county was to the flooded counties. Xu and co-author Sébastien Box-Couillard, a graduate student in ACE, published the findings in the journal Economic Inquiry.

The researchers also found regional climate disasters such as flooding can have a ripple effect on climate change behaviors and beliefs throughout an entire social network for up to three years afterwards.

Read more from the Illinois News Bureau.