Hope's resilience: moderating climate threat and future outlooks
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Literature on climate change reveals its existing power as a health threat to all of humanity. Research on the psychological impacts of climate change details the mental health toll that is exacted (e.g., distress and anxiety about what is to come with continued climate change). Many of these mental health concerns are future-oriented and indicate limited, negative, and uncertain views of the future. On the other hand, having open expectations and a positive outlook about the future has been shown to be important for a number of outcomes (e.g., well-being, protection against maladaptive behaviors, and lower anxiety and rumination). Thus, there is an important relation between perceptions of climate change and perceptions of the future, which both have implications for mental health. It is crucial to now consider what factors may protect from or provide resilience to these negative impacts. Hope is a well-known construct that indicates the belief that goals will be met in the future, or that desired outcomes may occur, which has been shown in many studies to be a protective factor. The purpose of the current study was to investigate the role of hope in relation to perceived climate threat and expectations about the future. A cross-sectional design was used with a sample of 231 undergraduate students (ages 18-29; M = 20.46; SD = 2.12) at a Midwestern university in the United States to investigate this research question. The results showed that having a higher perception of climate threat is related to a more limited view of the future. Additionally, this positive relation was strengthened by increasing levels of hope. The results also showed that, at low levels of hope, there is a positive relation between perceived climate threat and open future time perspectives; however, at high levels of hope, this relation becomes non-significant. Hope was found to have a null relation with pro-environmental behaviors, a positive relation with climate threat and limited and ambiguous views of the future, and a negative relation with open views of the future. Study limitations, implications, and future directions are discussed. Keywords: climate threat, future time perspectives, hope
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Introduction -- Review of literature -- Methodology -- Results -- Discussion/Conclusion
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M.A. (Master of Arts)