July 11, 2014 — As the world’s climate changes and severe weather events become more common one phenomenon of particular concern is human migration. How will people respond as precipitation patterns change, storms batter coastlines, crops struggle after continual years of drought? A study in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences compares how natural disasters and variations in climate influence migration, finding that the latter seems to have a greater effect than the former.

The study looked at more than 7,000 households in Indonesia over a 15-year time period. Though sudden disasters obviously do create situations where people are forced to move, the researchers found that such moves are more likely to be temporary or short-distance, whereas climatic variation more often results in permanent moves. Photo by United Nations Photo (Flickr | Creative Commons)