The Emotional Experience of Sustainability Courses: Learned Eco-Anxiety, Potential Ontological Adjustment

Peter Graham, Cassandra Kuyvenhoven, Rena Upitis, Adeela Arshad-Ayaz, Eli Scheinman, Colin Khan, Allison Goebel, R. Stephen Brown and Alice Hovorka
Additional contact information
Peter Graham: Peter Graham is with the Loyola College for Diversity and Sustainability, Concordia University, Montreal, QC, Canada.
Cassandra Kuyvenhoven: Cassandra Kuyvenhoven is with at the School of Environmental Studies, Queen’s University, Kingston, ON, Canada.
Rena Upitis: Rena Upitis is with the Faculty of Education, Queen’s University, Kingston, ON, Canada.
Adeela Arshad-Ayaz: Adeela Arshad-Ayaz is with the Department of Education, Concordia University, Montreal, QC, Canada.
Eli Scheinman: Eli Scheinman is with the School of Environmental Studies, Queen’s University, Kingston, ON, Canada.
Colin Khan: Colin Khan is with the School of Environmental Studies, Queen’s University, Kingston, ON, Canada.
Allison Goebel: Allison Goebel is with the School of Environmental Studies, Queen’s University, Kingston, ON, Canada.
R. Stephen Brown: R. Stephen Brown is with the School of Environmental Studies, Queen’s University, Kingston, ON, Canada.
Alice Hovorka: Alice Hovorka is with the Faculty of Environmental and Urban Change, York University, Toronto ON, Canada.

Journal of Education for Sustainable Development, 2020, vol. 14, issue 2, 190-204

Abstract: The knowledge content of university-level introductory sustainability courses elicits emotional reactions by students that are novel within the typical classroom context. Common negative reactions include ‘sadness’, ‘worry’, ‘guilt’ and ‘disgust’, while more positive responses include ‘feeling angry’, ‘empowered’, ‘like trying to make a difference’ or ‘having raised awareness’. These emotions are indexical of a deeper social epistemic collision between historically established social identities, including behavioural scripts consistent with, and generative of, unsustainability on the one hand, and a growing collective awareness of the consequent unsustainability that threatens students’ future well-being on the other. The authors argue that introductory sustainability courses set up the potential for not only a learned eco-anxiety, but also an ontological adjustment. That adjustment might bring student, historical inheritance and environment from a state of living in a suffering, but still separate, world to a practice of becoming with a world into which we extend and that also extends into us. Therefore, it is arguably important for instructors to be aware of the possibility of students getting into a negative state of eco-anxiety and for instructors to also have some tools for supporting a more positive ontological adjustment. We recommend that they become skilled in facilitating transformational learning by including some discussions about the ontology of self in any introductory sustainability instruction. Directing students’ attention to their own emotional responses can also be useful for grounding such classroom discussions and transformational learning.

Keywords: Eco-anxiety; emotion; ontology; self; transformative learning; sustainability curricula (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:jousus:v:14:y:2020:i:2:p:190-204

DOI: 10.1177/0973408220981163

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