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Education outcomes in the era of global climate change

Nature Climate Change volume 14, pages 214–224 (2024)Cite this article

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Abstract

Children and youth are vulnerable to the threat of climate change, yet potential non-health impacts, such as those on global education outcomes, are not well understood. In this cross-disciplinary review, we synthesize research linking climate change-related stressors with children’s education outcomes. We find that climate change is probably already undermining education outcomes for many populations worldwide via multiple direct and indirect pathways. We suggest that a developmental life-course framework is well suited to understanding these effects, particularly how climate risks can accumulate across the life course. Further, we show that existing vulnerabilities moderate the relationship between climate stressors and adverse education outcomes. We conclude with a discussion of current methodological challenges and outline future research directions.

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Fig. 1: Pathways and processes linking climate stressors to altered education outcomes.
Fig. 2: Mean years of schooling and vulnerability to climate change by country.
Fig. 3: Negative reinforcing cycle between climate change and poor education outcomes.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway

    Caitlin M. Prentice

  2. Department of Education, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK

    Caitlin M. Prentice

  3. Department of Special Needs Education, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway

    Francis Vergunst

  4. Data Science Institute, Columbia University, New York, NY, USA

    Kelton Minor

  5. Center for Social Data Science, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark

    Kelton Minor

  6. Australian Institute of Health Innovation, Macquarie University, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

    Helen L. Berry

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  2. Francis Vergunst
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Contributions

C.M.P., F.V. and H.L.B. conceptualized the project. All authors contributed to the literature search and synthesis. K.M., C.M.P. and F.V. developed the visualizations and figures. C.M.P. and F.V. drafted the paper. All authors reviewed and contributed substantial edits to the paper and approved the final version for submission.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Caitlin M. Prentice or Francis Vergunst.

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Nature Climate Change thanks Isaac M. Opper, Harry A. Patrinos and the other, anonymous, reviewer(s) for their contribution to the peer review of this work.

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Prentice, C.M., Vergunst, F., Minor, K. et al. Education outcomes in the era of global climate change. Nat. Clim. Chang. 14, 214–224 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-024-01945-z

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