Eco-anxiety in daily life: Relationships with well-being and pro-environmental behavior

Abstract

Prior research on eco-anxiety, or anxiety and worry about mounting environmental issues, has almost exclusively relied on cross-sectional trait reports. Consequently, little is known about how it is related to focal outcomes, such as well-being (e.g., happiness, meaning in life) and pro-environmental behavior, over time in daily life. To help address this issue, we conducted a preregistered daily diary study, wherein Canadian undergraduates (N = 132) provided trait reports and two weeks of daily reports (n = 1439) on eco-anxiety, positive and negative affect, meaning in life, and pro-environmental behavior. At the trait level, average scores on eco-anxiety were fairly low; yet, higher scores were associated with less positive affect and more negative affect and pro-environmental behavior. Average scores on eco-anxiety were even lower at the state level but nonetheless exhibited notable within-person variability. On days that people felt greater eco-anxiety, they also reported greater negative affect and pro-environmental behavior. Lagged analyses from one day to the next provided some evidence that eco-anxiety increases future negative affect. No significant relationships between eco-anxiety and meaning in life emerged at both levels of analysis. Together, these findings demonstrate that eco-anxiety can be productively conceived of—and studied as—both a trait and a state.