The Impact of Eco-Anxiety and Extreme Weather Proximity on Young People’s Happiness and Life Satisfaction: A Natural Experiment

This article investigates how eco-anxiety relates to subjective well-being among young people in Luxembourg, and whether this relationship is modified by proximity to extreme weather events. Luxembourg, with one of the highest GDPs in the world, represents a noteworthy case of a nation that also consistently ranks among the happiest. Yet it experienced a severe flooding in the summer of 2021. Using data from a natural experiment, we find that eco-anxiety is positively associated with happiness, an affective dimension of well-being, but unrelated to life satisfaction, a cognitive dimension. This association remains unchanged after experiencing the flooding, even among individuals directly affected by it. Our study contributes to the growing body of research on the relationship between well-being and eco-anxiety by disentangling the affective and cognitive dimensions of well-being in the context of an extreme weather event, using a natural experiment design. Overall, our findings suggest that eco-anxiety may be partly shaped by social desirability, rather than by intrinsic motivational beliefs and psychological distress. This conclusion may contribute to explaining why young people in high-income countries remain less inclined to take action against climate change.