Call for Papers: Special Thematic Section "Dynamics of Eco-Emotions"
Guest Editors: Helen Landmann, Panu Pihkala, Gisela Böhm
Emotions are among the strongest predictors of motivation for pro-environmental behavior and public support for climate policies (Böhm & Pfister, 2000; Brosch, 2021). Especially concerning people’s responses to climate change, emotions have become a very active and prolific research topic. However, a great heterogeneity of approaches exists and results are far from being conclusive (Brosch & Sauter, 2023). Many open questions remain. For example, which types of emotion are especially relevant in the environmental or climate domain and how can they be conceptualized? Which methodological approaches are best suited for measuring and investigating emotions? How do eco-emotions vary within a person, for example over time? How do various social and ecological contexts shape the dynamics of eco-emotions?
The aim of this special issue is to focus on the following three topics:
Conceptualizing eco-emotions (or more specifically climate emotions): How can we map the landscape of eco-emotions? While some attempts exist to classify eco- or climate emotions (Böhm & Pfister, 2000; Landmann, 2020; Pihkala, 2022a; Pfister & Böhm, 2008), these do not fully converge. Across studies, many different emotions are investigated and often the selection seems arbitrary. Furthermore, the way emotions are assessed varies from a combination of evaluations, action-tendencies, and feelings to assessments of only feelings (Landmann, 2024). This makes comparing studies challenging. We therefore welcome contributions that investigate which types of emotion are especially relevant in the context of environmental issues and climate change, how they are defined and measured and in which ways these emotions differ. Whenever possible, we encourage taking contextual factors such as social dynamics into account.
Causal effects of eco-emotions: Studies investigating the associations between emotions and environmental behavior are mainly correlational. Experimental studies that test for causal effects of emotion induction on pro-environmental behavior and policy support are rare and inconsistent (Schwartz & Loewenstein, 2017), which may be explained by (missing) affect-generalization (Landmann, 2020). We thus welcome contributions that experimentally test the effects of emotion-eliciting stimuli on individual or collective environmental attitudes or behavior. This may include short- and long-term effects of emotions as well as their effect on attitudes towards structural changes. Methodological discussions, for example, of the validity or reliability of different methodological approaches to studying eco-emotions, are also welcome.
Temporal dynamics of eco-emotions: The temporal dynamics of emotions are often not captured by self-reports used in environmental psychological research (Pihkala, 2022a). People may experience a variety of different, possibly conflicting, emotions in different contexts, at different points in time, or as a result of coping mechanisms. This special issue calls for contributions which explore temporal dynamics of emotions, how these dynamics are brought about and how they affect environmental beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors (e.g., by means of experience sampling). Some questions we are interested in include the following.
- What kind of combinations of moods and emotions exist in relation to environmental issues, and how do moods and emotions relate to each other? For example, could ecological grief be seen as a mood, which shapes and evokes many kinds of emotions, such as anger, guilt, sadness, and hope?
- How does a person’s phase in their process of experiencing eco-anxiety (Pihkala 2022b) affect their emotions? How could scholarship about eco-emotions take dynamics of such processes better into account? For example, a person who has recently become aware of the severity of the climate crisis probably experiences climate emotions in different ways than a person who has already managed to cope and adjust more.
We welcome qualitative and quantitative research. Contributions from the Global South are strongly encouraged, illustrating for instance different meanings of emotion labels and the impacts of various contexts.
If you would like to contribute to the special issue, please submit an abstract (max. 500 words) by 1st of June 2024 to the editors of the special issue (Helen Landmann, Panu Pihkala and Gisela Böhm). Deadline for the full papers is 23:59 GMT on 1st of December. It is not mandatory but strongly recommended to submit an abstract before submitting the full paper. Information about acceptable article types and word limits can be found on the journal website.
Timeline:
11.3.2024 Call for abstract
1.6.2024 Deadline for abstract submission
1.7.2024 Invitation of full papers
1.12.2024 Deadline for full paper submission
For further information, please contact the editors of the special issue:
Helen Landmann (helen.landmann@aau.at)
Panu Pihkala (panu.pihkala@helsinki.fi)
Gisela Böhm (gisela.boehm@uib.no)
References
Böhm, G., & Pfister, H. R. (2000). Action tendencies and characteristics of environmental risks. Acta Psychologica, 104(3), 317-337. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0001-6918(00)00035-4
Brosch, T. (2021). Affect and emotions as drivers of climate change perception and action: a review. Current Opinion in Behavioral Sciences, 42, 15-21. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cobeha.2021.02.001
Brosch, T., & Sauter, D. (2023). Emotions and the Climate Crisis: A Research Agenda for an Affective Sustainability Science. Emotion Review, 15(4), 253-257. https://doi.org/10.1177/17540739231193741
Landmann, H. (2020). Emotions in the context of environmental protection: Theoretical considerations concerning emotion types, eliciting processes, and affect generalization. Umweltpsychologie, 24(2). 61-73. http://umps.de/php/artikeldetails.php?id=745
Landmann, H. (2024). Emotions and Pro-Environmental Action – Common Misconceptions. BfN Schriften, https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/e5mkf
Pihkala, P. (2022a). Toward a taxonomy of climate emotions. Frontiers in Climate, 3, 738154. https://doi.org/10.3389/fclim.2021.738154
Pihkala, P. (2022b). The Process of Eco-Anxiety and Ecological Grief: A Narrative Review and a New Proposal. Sustainability, 14(24), 16628. https://doi.org/10.3390/su142416628.
Pfister, H. R., & Böhm, G. (2008). The multiplicity of emotions: A framework of emotional functions in decision making. Judgment and Decision Making, 3(1), 5-17. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1930297500000127
Schwartz, D., & Loewenstein, G. (2017). The chill of the moment: Emotions and proenvironmental behavior. Journal of Public Policy & Marketing, 36(2), 255-268. https://doi.org/10.1509/jppm.16.132