Introduction
Nailing a single definition of eco-anxiety is not an easy task. As highlighted by researcher Pihkala Panu, anxiety has been understood in many ways, from a general feeling of fear and worry to anxiety from a psychological standpoint which may result from emotional or mental distress and may manifest in grave physical distress (Panu, 2020).
Eco-Anxiety
When it comes to the environment, it’s easy to think that the effects of human-induced climate change only stop at the physical health, food security, and economic impacts. But it is necessary to understand that the effects of human-induced climate change also reach our mental health in the form of Eco-Anxiety.
In addition to the introduction already established, the term eco-anxiety is not exclusively any of the aforementioned meanings, but essentially possesses some of every aspect of them. Although eco-anxiety is a fast-spreading topic of academic discourse due to its gravity, it is not new to consider the impacts of social or environmental change on the mental wellbeing of individuals. For example, the term “placelessness” was coined to define the feeling or sense of a lack of home as an individual copes with the rapid changes in society such as technological or urban progress (Relph, 1976).
Eco-anxiety therefore inherently includes sociological factors, yielding from the change of society in relation to the changing environment and the prominent effects of climate change.
To capture the grimness of eco-anxiety it is helpful to define it as anxiety caused by environmental factors. That way, for example, if anxiety can be understood in one situation as a deep worry related to lack of control or knowledge about the future, then eco-anxiety would be understood as a deep worry related to lack of control or knowledge about the future of the planet or the future of one’s corner of the planet and insecurity about their place in it.
This understanding closely relates to the definition of eco-anxiety is simply a chronic fear of environmental doom by Clayton et al. (2017), but it also draws from a discourse which offers a subsurface view of eco-anxiety to highlight the internal tension faced by those who experience it as a result of the awareness of our anthropology to have caused environmental problems.
This research aims to capture the nature of eco-anxiety in Nigeria, the reasons for it, the ways in which it is expressed and how Nigerians cope or can cope with it. This research will also explore the capacity building as a solution to eco-anxiety.
Entrance of Environmental Issues into Nigerian Consciousness
For a long time, the status of Nigeria’s environment/climate has changed dramatically, and its quick transformation into an oil exploration site as well as the speed with which it is industrializing, has aided the proliferation of harmful by-products.
Furthermore, Nigeria’s rapid population growth and shift have also resulted in stress on the environment. In some parts of the country you find out that there are places with a higher concentration of people in a particular location irrespective of land mass, and this is not just because of more indigenous people presence, it’s also due to a deficit in development and opportunity in some rural regions in the country, thus, you have a large number of people moving to major cities and other thriving environments to access this opportunity, thereby unknowingly causing increasing environmental problems and stress.
With the by-products of Nigeria’s development, issues like air pollution, water pollution, mismanagement of waste, urban poverty, deforestation, etc. Are now on the rise, putting the environment and its inhabitants at risk. Consequently, taking an objective view, we see that Nigeria’s path is well en route to inducing mental stress on the lives of people. And reasons can be explained on two levels of eco-anxiety in Nigeria: the known and the unknown.
The unknown is a group of people that do not recognise the fact that environmental impacts whether experienced or heard affects both the physical and mental health. The people in this gap to a significant level are carefree about their physical health, and many at times oblivious about mental health in the context of climate change. The demography of this group is mostly the older generation.
The known on the other hand describes those that are aware of the impact the changes have on both their physical and mental health. And for most people in this category, the overwhelming nature of the issue causes them too inundated to even lift a finger in action against the mental impact of these problems.
In Nigeria, the mental concern for the impact of changes in the environment is still largely unexplored, this is partly due to the fact that the known and the unknown spaces are still dealing with their changing environment.
For people in the known space, eco-anxiety impacts in two ways. One stems from the fear of the environment soon being unable to host life on earth, and the other comes from being an environmental activist because activists and champions tend to care for the environment a lot different from the way most people do, that is they pour out time and effort in service to nature but now with eco-anxiety they have to debate the sensibility in continuing their service to nature amidst the wide of array of challenges they face as a climate champion.
Vulnerability to eco-anxiety.
The common description of sustainable development is development in a way that does not jeopardize the availability of resources for future generations (Brundtland, 1987), the perception that future generations do not or will not have enough resources presents a potential for anxiety. Therefore sheer acknowledgement of the environmental crises represents a vulnerability to eco-anxiety. In Nigeria, studies show that 22% of people have a substantial awareness of climate change and its adverse environmental effects (Ovuyovwiroye, 2013). Based on this, we can estimate that about 46,000,000 Nigerians are among the known group that are vulnerable to eco-anxiety based on the levels of eco-anxiety.
Manifestation and Effects of Eco-anxiety today
Eco-anxiety can be triggered by the socio-ecological crises that cause distress (Pihkala, 2020), and in Nigeria, there are a number of examples of these crises to point to as background contributors to Eco-anxiety. Instances of flood, drought, land degradation, soot across the nation, etc. All increase eco-anxiety levels in the country.
The nature of anxiety itself is not singular in its effects on individuals or groups (Pihkala, 2020), so one way to investigate its effect is by excavating from academic literature the effects of these insecurities, and cross-referencing against the observed reactions of people impacted by these crises to underscore the presence of eco-anxiety.
As explained by Pihkala (2020), there are many emotions that closely relate to anxiety and these can be used to determine the presence of eco-anxiety.
Image from Pihkala, 2020.
In Nigeria, eco-anxiety manifests in a common way and it is observed in the emotion of anger. Climate change activist and SustyVibes founder Jennifer Uchendu explains in a panel discussing eco-anxiety titled, In My Feelings About Climate Change: In Conversation explains; “In Nigeria, eco-anxiety is anger. It’s a lot of anger, especially when your health is directly impacted. The Niger Delta, and all of the oil spills, and everything that happens with people who assume they were supposed to be born into lands with oil. They’re supposed to be rich, they’re supposed to be very comfortable, but instead, they’re living with ruins, with polluted environments. Some places in the Niger Delta, they say, it’s not habitable. People can’t live there, the water is not safe. And it’s that anger. So you often see them express their anger through terrorism, through kidnapping and then insecurity increases.” (The Rights Studio, 2021).
Here you can understand that anger is explained as a manifestation of eco-anxiety as a result of negative environmental consequences which include degrading public health, loss of home and culture, loss of resources, economic benefits and securities which people affected deal with sometimes through the expression of anger in sometimes violent ways which may also morph into another emotion relative to the person.
Ogunbode et al. (2021) presents an insightful statistical examination of the existence of negative climate-related emotions, although the statistical methods used in that research involved convenience sampling and therefore prevent a generalization of its findings, nonetheless, it points towards key symptoms of eco-anxiety in the countries examined which includes Nigeria. This research found out that negative climate relative emotions were more prevalent in countries with lower self-reported mental health and also correlated with insomnia. Additionally, the research highlighted that young people reported lower mental health and women reported higher levels of insomnia (Ogunbode et al., 2021). This research also found that participants from non-western countries reported poorer mental health levels. This gives us insight into vulnerability factors such as economic insecurity, age and gender impacting eco-anxiety.
Addressing Eco-Anxiety
One way of addressing eco-anxiety would be to revive organizations and responsible offices into acting towards tackling the environmental and climate issues that cause eco-anxiety.
But also, beyond the technical approaches involved in advancing environmental action and activism, there also has to be an intentional development of skills and capacities in society to deal with mental stresses, particularly in the context of eco-anxiety. This endeavour is as unique as the circumstances that require it.
Essentially, it is necessary that those who express vulnerability to eco-anxiety are not detached or ostracized from their general society or community, the reason being that the help necessary for treating eco-anxiety may come from sources that may or may not be inherently environmental, thus, ostracism whether physically or emotionally should be discouraged with enthusiasm. It is important to know that people that express vulnerability to eco-anxiety
The general advancement of a more humane, inclusive, equitable and economically secure society, and also the advancement of mental health research and professionals, and societal safety nets would go a long way in combating eco-anxiety. As such, solution thinking must be holistic and integrative.
Conclusion
The entry of eco-anxiety in Nigeria is one that isn’t only common to climate activists, nonetheless, it’s prevalence in the known group, but as already discussed, its commonness in one level over the other doesn’t limit its existence in the societies, eco-anxiety thrives in the unknown group too i.e, people oblivious to human-induced climate change impacts and it’s ties with mental health. The deep reality is that whether you’re informed about eco-anxiety or not it still affects us one way or the other like climate change is irrespective of anyone and anything. But what is true is that it’s not a disease or a condition, and it doesn’t make anyone more human than the other if one happens to relate to eco-anxiety more as it doesn’t affect everyone equally.
References
Clayton, S., Manning, C. M., Krygsman, K., & Speiser, M. (2017). Mental health and our changing climate: Impacts, implications, and guidance. APA & EcoAmerica.
Hickman, C. (2020). We need to (find a way to) talk about… Eco-anxiety. Journal of Social Work Practice, 34(4), 411-424.
Pihkala, P. (2020). Eco-anxiety and environmental education. Sustainability, 12(23), 10149.
Ogunbode, C. A., Pallesen, S., Böhm, G., Doran, R., Bhullar, N., Aquino, S., … & Lomas, M. J. (2021). Negative emotions about climate change are related to insomnia symptoms and mental health: Cross-sectional evidence from 25 countries. Current Psychology, 1-10.
Brundtland, G. H. (1987). Our common future—Call for action. Environmental Conservation, 14(4), 291-294.
Relph, E. (1976). Place and placelessness (Vol. 67). London: Pion.
Ovuyovwiroye, P. A. (2013). Analysis of climate change awareness in Nigeria. Scientific Research and Essays, 8(26), 1203-1211.
The Rights Studio. 2021. In My Feelings About Climate Change: In Conversation. [online] available at: https://rights-studio.org/festival/climate-change-conversation/>