‘The planet is a gift but we’re the burden’: an IPA study exploring how young people engaged in climate action are experiencing climate change

In recent years, attention has been drawn to the psychological implications of climate change (Clayton, 2020). Importantly, climate change will disproportionally impact CYP (Sanson & Burke, 2019; Thiery et al., 2021), yet their voices have, until recently, largely been neglected. CYP’s views have been expressed predominantly through protest and large-scale structured surveys which have indicated that a significant proportion of CYP are concerned about the impacts of climate change on the world and their futures (e.g., Atherton, 2020; Children’s Commissioner, 2021; Friends of the Earth, 2020). Whilst some research has attempted to capture children’s views more holistically (e.g., Karsgaard & Davidson, 2021; Orlowski, 2020; Strife, 2012), qualitative research from the perspective of CYP remains sparse. The BPS DECP discussion paper highlighted the relevance of climate change within the EP profession and considered the role EPs have in seeking and representing CYP’s views on the topic (O’Hare, 2022a). Adopting a phenomenological positioning and using IPA as a research method, I aimed to understand how in a Western context CYP engaged in climate change action are experiencing climate change and what EPs can learn from these insights. Participants were selected purposively, and three young people aged 13 to 16 years took part. Visual methods were incorporated to support elicit verbal data through individual semi-structured interviews. Seven group experiential themes were identified:
• A sense of preciousness and being in awe of Earth – ‘It’s a sign of how beautiful our world is’
• A sense of loss and grief – ‘We’re destroying what we’re living on’
• A sense of guilt, betrayal and remorse – ‘The planet is a gift but we’re the burden’
• A sense of standing on the precipice: fear and insecurity of ‘what will become of our futures’
• A flicker of hope, a sense of possibility that ‘fate is in our hands’
• A sense of threat: climate change taps into other forms of destruction
• A sense of the other as an adversary – ‘They should be doing a lot more’.
Implications for educational psychology are discussed.