From leadership research to district action: Eco-Anxiety in Higher Education Professionals: Psychological Impacts, Institutional Trust, and Policy Implications

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Evidence and transfer

Education-related source: verify which participants, institutions and outcomes were actually studied before district adoption. Source publication type: research-article. License and identity checks do not establish study quality or causality.

Original authors’ abstract, reproduced under the source license:

Abstract Eco-anxiety—emotional distress arising from awareness of environmental collapse—has become a critical dimension of social sustainability, linking mental well-being, professional functioning, institutional trust, and climate governance. This study investigates how higher education professionals (HEPs) experience and interpret eco-anxiety within their professional contexts, situating it as a lens on institutional legitimacy from the perspective of those who produce, teach, and steward climate knowledge. A cross-sectional mixed-methods survey of 556 HEPs was conducted across a month in 2023, combining an adapted climate anxiety scale with open-ended narratives. Quantitative analyses identified perceived governmental inadequacy as the strongest correlate of climate worry (β = 0.48, p < 0.001), accounting for 26% of the variance, whereas institutional inadequacy had a weaker effect. Qualitative findings revealed pervasive emotions of moral injury, solastalgia, and exhaustion when sustainability rhetoric outpaced genuine action, with many respondents describing governmental and institutional “betrayal.” Integrating Cognitive Appraisal Theory with concepts of moral legitimacy, the study conceptualises eco-anxiety as a relational and ethically grounded emotion reflecting the perceived misalignment between knowledge and governance. Addressing it requires transparent climate leadership, participatory governance, and organisational care infrastructures to sustain motivation and trust within universities. Eco-anxiety thus may function not only as a personal pathology but also as a psychosocial response that can illuminate HEPs’ perceptions of institutional misalignment with sustainability commitments, with implications for higher education’s contribution to the Sustainable Development Goals. Keywords: eco-anxiety, social sustainability, higher education, institutional trust, climate governance, mental health, SDG 13, greenwashing, moral injury, solastalgia

Study methods

This study employed a cross-sectional mixed-methods design, integrating quantitative and qualitative data collected through a single online survey. The approach was designed to capture both the breadth and depth of eco-anxiety as experienced by HEPs—a phenomenon that is simultaneously psychological, moral, and institutional in nature. Quantitative data provided numerical estimates of the prevalence and associations of climate worry, while qualitative narratives offered interpretive insights into its emotional, ethical, and organisational dimensions, presented thematically (Braun & Clarke, 2006). Combining these strands enabled triangulation between measurable correlational associations and lived meanings, enhancing both validity and explanatory richness. A mixed-methods approach was selected because eco-anxiety encompasses affective, cognitive, and relational processes (Pihkala, 2022a), which are insufficiently captured by quantitative scales alone. The integration of numerical and narrative data supports a more holistic account of how professional actors appraise the adequacy of institutions and governments in responding to the climate crisis.

Limitations

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A 90-day district inquiry

Days 1–15 · Appraise. Read the source methods, recruitment, comparator, outcomes and limitations. Record how the study setting differs from your district and which claim the design can support.
Days 16–30 · Design. Select one recurring district decision. Publish the decision owner, evidence requirements, consultation process and appeal route; test the process on a bounded low-risk decision. Agree participation, privacy protections, baseline and stopping rules before starting.
Days 31–60 · Observe. Collect the pre-agreed measures, keep a log of implementation changes and invite confidential voluntary feedback. Preserve existing support for staff and learners.
Days 61–90 · Decide. Track decision time, unresolved objections, documented reasons, appeals and access differences. Review whether the process changes who can participate and who carries the burden. Make a dated decision to stop, revise or extend the inquiry.

Board decision brief

Present the local problem, source setting, evidence limits, intervention, responsible owner, total cost, measured changes and uncertainty. Separate staff perceptions, implementation measures and student learning outcomes.

Attribution and reuse

Sarah Louise Steele. Eco-Anxiety in Higher Education Professionals: Psychological Impacts, Institutional Trust, and Policy Implications. European Journal of Investigation in Health, Psychology and Education (2025-12-29). https://doi.org/10.3390/ejihpe16010006

Prepared 2026-11-07. Source authorship and DOI are preserved. The abstract and source passages are attributed extracts; this editorial guide is offered under the same CC BY 4.0 license.