Photo: Dean Rutz/The Seattle Times
Climate Anxiety & Eco-Grief
We usually focus on the physical impacts of climate change, but ecological loss is also taking a huge toll on mental health. As terms like "climate anxiety" and "eco grief" become more common, the climate movement is starting to take emotions seriously.
To successfully navigate the long emergency ahead, we need to build inner resilience, not just seawalls and solar panels. As a climate educator and researcher, Dr. Jennifer Atkinson works with students and communities to channel despair into action, and develop emotional strategies to stay engaged in climate solutions without becoming overwhelmed.
VIDEO
SPEAKING
IN THE NEWS
NPR Morning Edition. Nov 10, 2024
Universities are teaching students to combat anxiety with action
National Geographic . Jun 29, 2022
Climate anxiety is widespread among youth—can they overcome it?
Cascade PBS. Mar 6, 2024
How climate change is taxing our mental health
Washington Post . Apr 12, 2021
The Search for Environmental Hope
Got Climate Anxiety? These People Are Doing Something About It
New York Times . Feb 4, 2021
Slate Magazine. July 15, 2021
What Climate Scientists Are Saying About This Catastrophic Summer
NPR, Weekend Edition . Mar 9, 2020
Pandemic Gardens Satisfy A Hunger For More Than Just Good Tomatoes
Discover Magazine . Nov 29, 2021
How Does Climate Change Affect Human Health?
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Feeling distressed about climate change? Here’s how to manage it.
Grieving California. CODA Story, Dec 2022
Seattle Met Magazine . July 14, 2020
An Omnivore’s Guide to Eating Less Meat
Los Angeles Times . Jan 11, 2020
An artist set out to paint climate change. She ended up on a journey through grief.
Washington Post . Aug 27, 2019
How should we talk about what’s happening to our planet?
Talk Death . Aug 3, 2020
Ecological Grief: Mourning the Loss of Our Planet
Grist . June 4, 2019
The life-altering, world-ending
topic they’re still not teaching you about in school
Seattle Times . March 13, 2018
Feeling it: UW Bothell class helps students face emotional impact
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Outside Magazine . Nov 8, 2019
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Medium . Jan 24, 2019
Climate Change’s Hidden Victim:
Your Mental Health
High Country News . May 29, 2018
Addressing climate grief makes you a badass, not a snowflake
NBC News . Dec 24, 2018
'Climate grief': The growing emotional toll of climate change
Inverse . Sept 26, 2019
You are not safe: My life under the existential dread of climate change
University of Washington News . Nov 12, 2019
Jennifer Atkinson speaks on
eco-anxiety
Q13 Fox . Jan 24, 2018
Global warming bringing you down? Washington state college offers course on 'eco-anxiety,' ‘climate grief’
Fox News . April 2, 2019
Feeling hopeless about
climate change?
There’s a class for that (at UW Bothell)
Grist . June 20, 2019
How one school is getting kids fired up about climate solutions
Bothell-Kenmore Reporter . Feb 21, 2019
UW Bothell seminar aims to help students cope with climate change concerns
UPI . Aug 28, 2019
'Eco-anxiety' over climate change causing stress, panic in millions, experts say
UW Bothell News . Feb 28, 2018
Acknowledging eco grief
and climate anxiety
Nexus Media . June 12, 2018
Uncovering the Mental Health Crisis of Climate Change
MSN News . July 22, 2019