The role of trait mindfulness in moderating climate distress during wildfire season

Abstract

Extreme worry about climate change can lead to maladaptive climate distress, defined as avoiding negative thoughts and feelings about climate. Avoiding negative thoughts and feelings (“experiential avoidance”) is a risk factor for clinical depression and anxiety. Greater ability for mindful metacognition may lead to greater tolerance of negative feelings and thus less maladaptive climate distress. To test this hypothesis, we assessed climate distress in a community sample of adults (n = 501) from the San Francisco Bay Area, before and after the severe wildfire season in 2021. Specifically, we measured experiential avoidance of distress about climate at baseline and 6 months later after the wildfire season. At baseline, climate distress was higher in women, and among people with lower trait mindfulness, higher generalized anxiety, and more liberal political ideology. Climate distress significantly increased across the sample after the wildfire season. However, this increase occurred in individuals with low mindfulness, but not high mindfulness, at baseline. As climate disasters become more frequent and severe, the ability to face the existential threat without severe distress will be an important adaptive ability and is hypothesized to help people stay engaged in climate actions. Here, we show that mindfulness may be a useful aid in maintaining lower climate distress over time, despite wildfire exposure.