Community Mental Health Toolkit for Environmental Justice and Climate Change

Lead PI: Jonathan Sury , , Lena Verdeli, Laura Smith

Unit Affiliation: National Center for Disaster Preparedness (NCDP)

January 2021 - December 2022
Inactive
Global
Project Type: Research

DESCRIPTION: Environmental injustice disproportionately impacts communities already marginalized as the result of poverty and racism. As we live in an era of extreme events driven by the cascading effects of global climate change, the impact on these individuals and communities is immense. These climatic changes affect many communities directly in an immediately observable way but for many others, these changes are insidious both of which result in a disruption of mental health and well-being. This crisis adds to the burden of environmental justice advocates and community-based organizations to self-mobilize and not only advocate but care for the health of their communities. This Earth Frontier aims to build upon a body of work to employ community-based participatory action research methods to develop, design, test, and deploy a Community Mental Health Toolkit, focused on environmental justice and climate, to be implemented at the hyperlocal level. The interdisciplinary team composed of experts on global mental health, disaster preparedness and recovery, community resilience, this approach will provide synergy in the design of a high impact product built for and with those directly affected by the climate crises.

SPONSOR:

Earth Institute Earth Frontiers

RESEARCH TEAM:

Jillian Arenz, Srishti Sardana. Dr. Sandra Willis, Dr. Jura Augustinavicius, Dr. Oren Pizmony-Levy, Dr. Sonali Rajan, Dr. Mahbobe Ghods, Dr. Dinelia Rosa, Dr. Alexis Merdjanoff, Dr. Amy Nitza, Dr. Gary Belkin

COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY COLLABORATORS:

Teachers College

KEYWORDS

climate mental health disaster preparedness climate change community resilience participatory processes environmental justice

THEMES

Sustainable living