Silent Strain: The Psychological Impact of Climate Change on the Youngest Generation

In the 21st century, climate change is one of the most pressing global challenges. It doesn’t just harm the environment; it also affects human health and overall societal well-being. We often talk about its physical effects like rising temperatures, floods, droughts, and storms, but we forget that it also has serious emotional and mental effects, especially on children.      

Since their bodies and minds are still developing, children are among the groups most at risk from climate change. They are more affected by heat, pollution, and disasters like floods or droughts. Unlike adults, they may not fully understand what’s happening, but they still feel scared, stressed, or confused. Today’s generation of children is growing up in a world where the environment is changing rapidly and dangerously. While children are among the least responsible for causing climate change, they are the ones facing its harshest long-term impacts. This has led to a growing concern about how climate change is affecting children’s mental health and emotional well-being.

Urie Bronfenbrenner’s Ecological Systems Theory helps us understand how climate change affects children’s mental health by looking at all the different environments that shape their lives. First shared in his 1979 book The Ecology of Human Development, the theory says that a child doesn’t grow up in isolation; they are influenced by their surroundings, from family and school to larger communities, culture, and even global events. The microsystem is the closest layer, like family and friends you interact with daily. The mesosystem is how those close connections relate to each other, such as your parents talking to your teachers. The exosystem includes things that affect you indirectly, like your parents' workplace. The macrosystem is the broader culture, laws, and values around you. Lastly, the chronosystem adds the element of time, considering life changes and historical events that shape development. These systems all work together to influence how a person grows and changes. (Cherry, 2023) Children’s development is influenced by several layers of their environment, not only what occurs at home, as demonstrated by Bronfenbrenner's Theory.      

Through their homes, schools, and friends, children are directly impacted at the microsystem level. For instance, children experience increased stress when parents worry about landslides or when schools are closed during emergencies. At the mesosystem level, relationships between various environments, such as the way parents and teachers discuss climate change, have an impact on how kids perceive and deal with it. The exosystem consists of things that children are not directly in control of but that still have an effect on them, such as government reactions to natural disasters or the media's dissemination of intimidating climate news.

At the macrosystem level, laws, economic conditions, and broader cultural norms shape how society perceives climate change and how much support children receive. Lastly, the chronosystem emphasizes the importance of timing, referring to the specific historical or developmental period during which a child grows up. When children spend their formative years in an era of frequent climate disasters, it can have lasting negative effects on their emotions, resilience, and mental health. In short, this theory demonstrates that children are impacted by climate change not just because of the actual disasters themselves, but also because of a complex network of factors, including their parents, schools, governments, and society, all of which interact to influence their psychological health. (Yang & Oh, 2024)

A study by (Hickman et al., 2021) surveyed 10,000 young people aged 16–25 from ten countries, with 1,000 participants per country. The survey was administered online via Kantar between May and June 2021 and collected information on participants’ emotions related to climate change and their perceptions of government responses. The findings revealed that 59 percent of respondents were worried or extremely worried about climate change, while 84 percent were at least moderately worried. More than half reported feeling sad, anxious, angry, powerless, helpless, or guilty, and over 45 percent indicated that these feelings negatively affected their daily functioning. Furthermore, 75 percent described the future as frightening, and 83 percent believed that humanity has failed to take care of the planet. Participants generally rated government responses as inadequate, reporting stronger feelings of betrayal than reassurance, and climate anxiety was strongly linked to perceptions of insufficient government action.

A different study conducted during the 2022 floods in northeastern Bangladesh interviewed 53 adolescents living in flood shelters and revealed alarming levels of mental health problems. Approximately 84 percent of boys and 80 percent of girls suffered from depression, while 60.72 percent of boys and 71.42 percent of girls had PTSD. Compared to male-identifying participants, girls held higher levels of trauma and depressive symptoms, underscoring their increased vulnerability and disproportionately felt impacts. Widespread youth anxiety, rage, and social distress were heightened by the death of loved ones, the closing of schools, and lackluster housing, not to mention scarce resources and social isolation. The researchers highlight how important it is to provide teenagers in disaster-prone communities with resilience-building programs and mental health assistance. (Siddik et al., 2024)

Climate change-induced stressors impair emotional and cognitive development, increasing the likelihood that children may develop mental health issues throughout their childhood years. Disasters such as floods or wildfires can result in behavioral problems, anxiety, stress, and interruptions to caregiving in young children. Insecurity, despair, and anxiety are frequently brought on by homelessness, displacement, and interrupted education in middle childhood. During adolescence, when social awareness and identity are crucial, climate change can lead to maladaptive behaviors, existential dread, despair, and climate anxiety. In general, prolonged exposure to climatic stressors impairs resilience and neurodevelopment, increasing vulnerability to mental health issues such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression, and anxiety during childhood and adolescence. (Vergunst et al., 2022)  

The emerging evidence in scientific literature on the intersection of climate change and youth development and well-being reveals a number of important implications. As a result of environmental disturbances like heatwaves, cyclones, and floods, climate change puts children at risk for physical health issues, including illnesses and malnutrition. Their mental health is also impacted, which can result in elevated stress, anxiety, sadness, and PTSD levels, particularly in flood-prone locations where kids feel frustrated and powerless. Development is further hampered by learning deficits and social isolation brought on by significant weather-related disruptions to schools. (Rahman, 2025)

Furthermore, children face barriers to accessing healthcare, education, and social involvement, all of which are crucial throughout the early stages of development. Families must contend with these circumstances by adopting various coping mechanisms, such as cutting back on essentials, selling assets, and experiencing financial hardship, which might make them more vulnerable and have an indirect impact on the long-term development and emotional stability of their children. (Rahman, 2025) In the UK, children's climate anxiety has sharply increased, with 70 percent expressing fear about the planet they will inherit, according to a recent study conducted ahead of COP27. A thorough survey conducted with 3,000 children by Save the Children revealed that 75 percent of youth believe the government should take stronger action in addressing both climate change and social inequality. The results also showed that, in the United Kingdom, 60 percent of children feel that these problems are already having an impact on the mental health of their generation, and 56 percent believe that this is the reason why the decline of youth mental health is an international phenomenon. (Save the Children UK, n.d.)

When children learn about climate change, they may feel a variety of negative feelings, such as anxiety, guilt, helplessness, impotence, hopelessness, rage, despair, phobia, sorrow, and sadness. These unpleasant reactions are frequently referred to by terms such as eco-distress, eco-anxiety, and climate anxiety. Studies have also revealed that a lot of children experience anxiety and fear as a result of their understanding of climate change. (Martin et al., 2021) 

Children employ a variety of coping mechanisms to deal with the effects of climate change, which may be broadly divided into three categories: problem-focused coping, meaning-focused coping, and de-emphasizing the seriousness of the threat. Actively attempting to control or resolve the problem is known as problem-focused coping, and it has been linked to increased environmental involvement and happy emotional states. More optimism, life satisfaction, and environmental effectiveness are associated with meaning-focused coping, which also helps control negative emotions. This coping strategy integrates positive reappraisal and trust. De-emphasizing the severity of climate change is a coping strategy that can affect pro-environmental activity and emotions of environmental efficacy. It may also alleviate distress, but it may also result in decreased participation. All things considered, these coping mechanisms affect kids' emotional health and perspectives on environmental action. (Ojala, 2012) 

The media, parents, and schools all contribute to kids’ perceptions and understanding of climate change. Children who had parents who understood that they were worried about climate change had better adaptive coping strategies. Children who see their parents as not overly concerned are more likely to act independently (problem-focused), communicate with their parents and friends (emotion-focused), and downplay the threat or deny (emotion-focused). Children who witness their parents' excessive anxiety employ a variety of coping strategies, including emotion-focused avoidance, meaning-focused technology hope, emotion-focused talking to parents and friends, and problem-focused individual action. The results show that youngsters use more adaptive coping strategies when they know their parents understand their worries. (Léger-Goodes et al., 2023)      

Children deal with climate change in different ways, and these can be seen through a SWOT lens. Their strength lies in using problem-focused and meaning-focused coping, which helps them stay hopeful, active, and emotionally balanced. However, a weakness is that some children may deny or downplay the problem, which can stop them from taking action or developing long-term resilience. There are also many opportunities for parents, schools, and the media to guide children to healthier coping strategies by listening to and acknowledging their worries, encouraging problem-solving, and building hope. At the same time, there are threats such as parents showing too much anxiety or too little concern, which can confuse children and push them toward avoidance, denial, or helplessness. Overall, how children cope with climate change greatly depends on the support and guidance they receive from the adults and communities around them.

Children's empowerment, self-efficacy, and optimism are fostered when they are involved in understanding, planning for, and resolving climate-related threats, as evidenced by catastrophe resilience programs such as the Disaster Resilience Education (DRE) intervention in Chennai, India (Krishna et al., 2022), in which children co-designed the sessions, took part in DRR (Disaster Risk Reduction) planning, learned first-aid and preparedness skills, and reported feeling more confident, less anxious, and more able to contribute to decisions in their homes and communities. This interactive method lessens children's worry and anxiety about impending calamities, fosters a proactive mentality, and makes them feel more capable of handling environmental challenges. In addition to providing them with necessary skills, empowering children and actively involving them in climate adaptation initiatives helps them develop psychological resilience, which in turn promotes optimism in the face of the challenges posed by climate change.

For young people facing a fast-changing world, this kind of participation can act as a crucial buffer against stress associated with climate change, fostering mental health and a sense of agency. (Krishna et al., 2022) This approach shows that when children are given meaningful roles in climate action, they not only gain practical skills but also develop confidence, hope, and a stronger sense of control over their future. Such involvement helps them manage stress more effectively, encourages positive coping strategies, and strengthens their overall mental well-being in the face of climate uncertainties.

Climate change is not just an environmental issue; it is also a mental health emergency for the youngest generation. Children are forced to live through a climate crisis. We must protect their futures, not only by fighting climate change but also by caring for their emotional and mental well-being.

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About the Author:

Swarnika Pudasaini is a final-year Social Work student at St. Xavier’s College, Maitighar. As an LSRA Research Award recipient, she has developed a strong research interest and has gained practical experience through internships in diverse social work settings. Swarnika is committed to meaningful social change and strives to integrate learning with action.

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References

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