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Fears about climate change are impacting young people’s mental health
Irish Times ^ | 03/17/2022 | Padraig O'Morain

Posted on 03/24/2022 9:17:37 PM PDT by SeekAndFind

In about half of people, mental illnesses arise before age 18 - add climate change fears and the outlook is grim

Suppose you wake up in the night and you notice flames coming from downstairs. You ring for the fire brigade and they say you’re probably imagining it.

Anyway, they add, by the time they could get there it would be too late anyway.

As you watch your house burn, your feelings might include anger, a sense of betrayal and grief.

Is that an extreme metaphor for the feelings of young people towards older generations and governments in regard to climate change?

It’s the impression that comes across to me from research led by the University of Bath and published, prior to being peer reviewed, on the Lancet website. Information was collected last year from 10,000 people in 10 countries including the UK, France, Australia, India and Nigeria.

To me the findings suggest that anxiety and other negative emotions affect younger people to a greater extent than, perhaps, older people appreciate.

If you add in the number of older people who feel the same way then we have a crisis of fear and anxiety that goes unrecognised. The understandable preoccupation with Ukraine has pushed climate change into the background, but it remains a major source of concern and of future mental ill-health.

In the research, almost 60 per cent of respondents said they felt “very” or “extremely” worried about climate change. Over 45 per cent said they felt negatively affected in their daily lives.

Levels of fear were high with as many as 77 per cent saying the future was frightening. Almost half felt dismissed or ignored when they talked to other people about their fears. What this means to me is that climate change is already affecting the emotional wellbeing of significant numbers of people. Directly or indirectly that additional stress, in an already stressful world, will become an increasingly serious source of suffering. It will also make increasing demands on mental health services.

Not all of this will be obvious. Serious emotional pressures can trigger mental illness. The illness may be treated without a recognition that the source was climate change.

The vulnerability-stress theory which originated in the 1960s, states that stresses can bear down on the individual in ways that trigger conditions such as depression, anxiety or schizophrenia. Tragically, these stresses can lead to suicide.

Lots of people go through their whole lives without ever having to know that they have a genetic vulnerability to a mental illness because they never encounter a stress that triggers it. Others are not so lucky and under stress they experience a life-changing psychiatric disorder.

If you take a newish stressor like fears about climate change, it seems to me that this can only lead to increases in mental illness or in degrees of suffering that fall short of psychiatric disorders. And this is all without even considering the direct effects of extreme climate events on mental health.

Research published in the journal Nature suggests an association between extreme weather events and suicide. When pregnant women are traumatised in weather events, the children can suffer mental or physical issues in later life.

In about half of people, mental illnesses arise before the age of 18. For that age group, add in growing worry about climate change and the outlook is grim.

What can be done? One, I think, is to listen to young people’s fears with respect and not to dismiss them. Another is to be seen to be pushing for action by governments on climate change and to be doing our own bit in our own lives to respect the environment. We could encourage young people in promoting action on climate change.

In particular we could recognise that we are being hurt already by climate change even though Ireland has not yet suffered catastrophic events such as floods or extreme heat. But the mental health threat is surely encroaching already like first waves of a tide. And as with the first waves of a tide, it is important not to ignore them and end up trapped.


Padraig O’Morain is accredited by the Irish Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy. His books include Kindfulness - a guide to self compassion


TOPICS: Health/Medicine; Science; Society
KEYWORDS: carbonpropaganda; climatechange; climatehoax; fakenews; fakescience; greenputinpuppets; izmeneniyeklimata; mentalhealth; noitsthevaccine; oldnews; padraigogreenmoron; padraigomorain; padraigomoron; pootygreenies; putinapproves; russiaapproves; theapprovednarrative
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1 posted on 03/24/2022 9:17:37 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
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To: SeekAndFind

The yutes have it so good that they have to make up stuff to worry about.


2 posted on 03/24/2022 9:24:22 PM PDT by No Party Affiliation
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To: SeekAndFind

What can be done? One, I think, is to listen to young people’s fears with respect and not to dismiss them.


How about telling them they are being lied to?


3 posted on 03/24/2022 9:25:44 PM PDT by PeterPrinciple (Thinking Caps are no longer being issued but there must be a warehouse full of them somewhere.)
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To: SeekAndFind

You mean ‘vaccinated’ youths have abruptly begun to worry about climate change to the point it’s harming their mental health? Because there are some who have written papers claimning the ‘vax’ will do that too.


4 posted on 03/24/2022 9:34:14 PM PDT by ransomnote (IN GOD WE TRUST)
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To: PeterPrinciple
How about telling them they are being lied to?

Putin's green youth puppets can't even feel their strings...

Izmeneniye Klimata


5 posted on 03/24/2022 9:39:42 PM PDT by kiryandil (China Joe and Paycheck Hunter - the Chink in America's defenses)
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To: SeekAndFind

When the Irish youths no longer have food on their tables and there’s no more electricity or gas, I’m certain they’ll die happy knowing how they saved the planet.


6 posted on 03/24/2022 9:43:06 PM PDT by Dogbert41 (Hungering and thirsting for Righteousness...)
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To: SeekAndFind

Who would have thought that nonstop doom and gloom with little to no basis in reality would cause gullible youth to suffer from mental issues?


7 posted on 03/24/2022 9:43:59 PM PDT by fireman15 (Irritating people are the grit from which we fashion our pearl. I provide the grit. You're Welcome.)
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To: SeekAndFind

What is to be expected when people are constantly bombarded by various messages of doom? Most news reporting is sensationalized, including the weather. Any weather outside of 73 degrees and sunny is claimed to be the result of climate change. What passes for education plays a big role too. Of course, people who have been ground down and are fearful are easier to control, which is one of the intended results of the propaganda.


8 posted on 03/24/2022 9:50:18 PM PDT by Southside_Chicago_Republican (The more I learn about people, the more I like my dog. )
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To: No Party Affiliation
Sadly they did not make it up.

This is a fear that has been fed to them since they first started school.

Maybe before since the number of children's shows are all about how "poor erf" is dying.

9 posted on 03/24/2022 9:54:57 PM PDT by Harmless Teddy Bear (It is better to light a single flame thrower then curse the darkness. A bunch of them is better yet)
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To: SeekAndFind

Well, that’s what crazy does to a person.

Shocker! /s

Who’s surprised???


10 posted on 03/24/2022 9:57:01 PM PDT by logi_cal869 (-cynicus the "concern troll" a/o 10/03/2018 /!i!! &@$%&*(@ -)
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To: SeekAndFind

Quit raising weak, woke, wimps! Quit it people!


11 posted on 03/24/2022 10:04:04 PM PDT by vpintheak (Live free, or die!)
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To: SeekAndFind

How about we lock up the arsonists(media and politicians)?


12 posted on 03/24/2022 10:04:09 PM PDT by gundog ( It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen. )
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To: SeekAndFind

The yutes will soon learn what to really worry about, like keeping warm and food and getting to where they need to be instead of satisfying their heart’s desire.

Self-actualization and the climate will be a thing of the past.

The Fourth Turning has arrived, not all will survive and it will be very rough for all but the elites.


13 posted on 03/24/2022 10:05:20 PM PDT by Sequoyah101 (Politicians are only marginally good at one thing, being politicians. Otherwise they are fools.)
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To: Harmless Teddy Bear

I suppose it is to them like the threat of nuclear annihilation was to some of us growing up. It may be worse, they have a steady diet of it.


14 posted on 03/24/2022 10:07:25 PM PDT by Sequoyah101 (Politicians are only marginally good at one thing, being politicians. Otherwise they are fools.)
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To: SeekAndFind
"Fears about climate change are impacting young people’s mental health"

Maybe they don't spend enough time talking to their grandparents about what the climate was like in the olden days.
15 posted on 03/24/2022 10:27:12 PM PDT by clearcarbon (Fraudulent elections have consequences.)
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To: SeekAndFind

No surprise, they would have to be shielded from public schools, the MSM and TikTok to successfully avoid the constant drumbeat of impending doom.


16 posted on 03/24/2022 10:34:54 PM PDT by GnuThere
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To: SeekAndFind

I didn’t realize youths had any mental health. Must of added that after I got old.


17 posted on 03/24/2022 10:35:00 PM PDT by Equine1952
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To: Harmless Teddy Bear
This is a fear that has been fed to them since they first started school.

And that is why I despise teachers.

18 posted on 03/24/2022 10:37:48 PM PDT by Jeff Chandler (THE ISSUE IS NEVER THE ISSUE. THE REVOLUTION IS THE ISSUE.)
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To: SeekAndFind
Corrected headline:

Fears caused by lies about climate change are impacting young people’s mental health

19 posted on 03/24/2022 10:39:12 PM PDT by JimRed (TERM LIMITS, NOW! Militia to the border! TRUTH is the new HATE SPEECH.)
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To: Sequoyah101
like the threat of nuclear annihilation was to some of us growing up ...

If Vlad launches a nuclear war, climate change will be the least of their worries.

20 posted on 03/24/2022 10:55:18 PM PDT by Schatze (It's better to keep your mouth shut and appear stupid than to open it and remove all doubt.)
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