Climate Mental Health

Learn strategies to help students process climate-related emotions, build resilience, and inspire positive action and emotional well-being with CEEE's climate mental health resources.

In response to the climate crisis, many around the world, especially young people, have reported feeling overwhelmed, powerless, sad, and anxious. How can we teach these topics without overwhelming our students or causing anxiety? How do we support youth in stepping up rather than shutting down?

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Educators

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Public

Contact

ceee@colorado.edu

Many of the strategies described in the tiles below can apply both to students and to teachers and caregivers. As you read through, think about strategies you can adopt to support your students at all age levels (Your Guide to Talking With Kids of All Ages About Climate Change), those that you can recommend to your students' parents and caregivers, and those you can employ yourself.

Consider visiting the Climate Mental Health Network for more resources and strategies to support Climate Mental Health.

The videos and curriculum below are also offered through The Climate Literacy and Energy Awareness Network (CLEAN), a nationally renowned, award-winning, online clearinghouse that features 800+ high-quality teaching resources around climate and energy topics that are peer-reviewed for scientific accuracy and pedagogical best practice

The Hazard Education, Awareness, and Resilience Task Force (HEART Force) is an award-winning collaborative project implemented by the NOAA Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES) and Climate Adaptation Partnership (CAP) partner Western Water Assessment that engages rural Colorado middle and high school students, teachers, and communities to take proactive steps in preparing for and responding to natural hazards.

As students learn about in the HEART Force Program, resilience, or the capacity to successfully recover from difficulties, is important in helping communities recover after a natural disaster. Resiliency at the individual level, however, is also important; Resiliency helps overcome and heal from trauma. HEART Force provides the collection: Trauma-Informed Practices & Mental Health Strategies to Foster Hope and Resilience to assist educators in framing units and lessons about natural hazards within a trauma-informed and hopeful approach. The collection includes a trauma-informed practices guide, HEART Force lesson plans that encourage a hopeful community vision and solution-oriented actions, and more resources from a variety of sources on climate mental health.

We include curriculum resources and videos from HEART Force's trauma-informed practices and mental health strategies collection below and you can access the resource collection in its entirety here.

Understanding Climate Mental Health

Goals

The goal is to facilitate the expression, processing, and validation of youths' climate emotions (Climate Change & Youth Mental Health, 2021) while also encouraging positive emotions and reducing stress.

The goal is not to eliminate negative emotions, those who experience negative emotions about climate change are more likely to engage in climate action (Affect and emotions as drivers of climate change perception and action, 2021). However, if emotions are exceeding a personal threshold, it can result in becoming angry or disengaged. Resiliency is not about the absence of negative emotions; it is about managing these emotions without letting them get "stuck" to avoid larger mental health challenges.

By becoming more resilient through taking action, listening, finding shared solidarity in the community, moving through our grief, incorporating trauma-informed practices, practicing social, emotional, and positive coping skills, and cultivating hope, we can expand our resiliency and move towards empowerment.

Challenges

Climate change impacts youth mental health in direct and indirect ways. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change highlights worsening global effects such as droughts, famine, species loss, and extreme weather, increasing stress and uncertainty.

Direct impacts
Research shows that climate-related disasters significantly affect mental health. Depression and PTSD can persist for years after wildfires or hurricanes. Youth exposed to these hazards may struggle with emotional regulation, academic performance, and resilience. Climate-driven displacement and loss of stability further disrupt development.

Indirect impacts
Eco-anxiety, chronic worry, and fear about climate change’s long-term effects are growing concerns. A global survey of 10,000 young people revealed distress, including sadness, anxiety, and distrust toward governments. Many struggle to navigate an uncertain future, affecting their security. Addressing these impacts requires emotional support and coping strategies.

Graphic about emotions youth feel about climate change — Adapted from Hickman et al., 2021

CEEE has compiled a collection of climate mental health resources, including curriculum, videos, and websites, offering strategies for processing climate change-related emotions and inspiring hope. The resources below combine trauma-informed approaches, mental health support, and solution-focused activities to inspire positive action and emotional well-being. By addressing climate-related emotions, they aim to transform anxiety and helplessness into a sense of hope and purpose, empowering students to take meaningful, solution-driven action for a more sustainable future.