Pilot Study: Student Experience of Climate Change Anxiety and Student Inclination Toward Ethical Behaviour

It is well established that climate change affects the emotional and psychological health of some individuals, with anxiety being a frequent presentation of the experience and anticipation of climate change. Engineers regularly engage with climate change topics as technology plays a significant role in the human adaptation to, and mitigation of, climate change throughout Canada and beyond. Professional engineers are also held to a high standard of ethics that holds paramount the health, safety, and wellbeing of the public, a requirement that may conflict with opportunities for personal, financial enrichment. In this pilot study, we explore correlations of anxiety and the experience of climate change on engineering student proclivity toward ethical behaviour. Preliminary results from a small cohort of participants show complex interactions between perceptions and experience of climate change and attitudes toward engineering ethics, with several archetypes proposed to serve as a foundation for a larger study. Understanding the influence of climate change on ethical behaviour and sources of student anxiety can help guide engineering educational practice toward greater effectiveness in a changing sociocultural environment.