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Eco-reproductive concerns in the age of climate change

Author

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  • Matthew Schneider-Mayerson

    (Yale-NUS College)

  • Kit Ling Leong

    (Yale-NUS College)

Abstract

Media reports and public polls suggest that young people in many countries are increasingly factoring climate change into their reproductive choices, but empirical evidence about this phenomenon is lacking. This article reviews the scholarship on this subject and discusses the results of the first empirical study focused on it, a quantitative and qualitative survey of 607 US-Americans between the ages of 27 and 45. While 59.8% of respondents reported being “very” or “extremely concerned” about the carbon footprint of procreation, 96.5% of respondents were “very” or “extremely concerned” about the well-being of their existing, expected, or hypothetical children in a climate-changed world. This was largely due to an overwhelmingly negative expectation of the future with climate change. Younger respondents were more concerned about the climate impacts their children would experience than older respondents, and there was no statistically significant difference between the eco-reproductive concerns of male and female respondents. These and other results are situated within scholarship about growing climate concern in the USA, the concept of the carbon footprint, the carbon footprint of procreation, individual actions in response to climate change, temporal perceptions of climate change, and expectations about the future in the USA. Potential implications for future research in environmental psychology, environmental sociology, the sociology of reproduction, demography, and climate mitigation are discussed.

Suggested Citation

  • Matthew Schneider-Mayerson & Kit Ling Leong, 2020. "Eco-reproductive concerns in the age of climate change," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 163(2), pages 1007-1023, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:climat:v:163:y:2020:i:2:d:10.1007_s10584-020-02923-y
    DOI: 10.1007/s10584-020-02923-y
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    Cited by:

    1. Bodin, Maja & Björklund, Jenny, 2022. "“Can I take responsibility for bringing a person to this world who will be part of the apocalypse!?”: Ideological dilemmas and concerns for future well-being when bringing the climate crisis into repr," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 302(C).
    2. Hervé, Fabrice & Marsat, Sylvain, 2024. "Like daughter, like father: Female socialization and green equity investment," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 96(PA).
    3. David E. Bloom & Michael Kuhn & Klaus Prettner, 2024. "Fertility in High-Income Countries: Trends, Patterns, Determinants, and Consequences," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 16(1), pages 159-184, August.
    4. Hilary Graham & Pete Lampard & Su Golder, 2025. "A Review of Qualitative Studies of Parents’ Perspectives on Climate Change," Societies, MDPI, vol. 15(4), pages 1-15, April.
    5. Panu Pihkala, 2024. "Ecological Sorrow: Types of Grief and Loss in Ecological Grief," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(2), pages 1-44, January.
    6. Tanja Russell, 2024. "A ‘greenhouse affect’? Exploring young Australians’ emotional responses to climate change," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 177(5), pages 1-20, May.
    7. Steffen Peters & Erich Striessnig & Maria Rita Testa & Alessandra Trimarchi & Natalie Nitsche, 2023. "Too worried about the environment to have children? Or more worried about the environment after having children? The reciprocal relationship between environmental concerns and fertility," MPIDR Working Papers WP-2023-023, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany.
    8. Powdthavee, Nattavudh & Oswald, Andrew J. & Lockwood, Ben, 2024. "Are environmental concerns deterring people from having children? Longitudinal evidence on births in the UK," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 220(C).
    9. Amanda Rikner Martinsson & Maria Ojala, 2024. "Patterns of climate-change coping among late adolescents: Differences in emotions concerning the future, moral responsibility, and climate-change engagement," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 177(8), pages 1-21, August.
    10. Lockwood, Ben & Powdthavee, Nattavudh & Oswald, Andrew J., 2022. "Are Environmental Concerns Deterring People from Having Children?," IZA Discussion Papers 15620, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    11. Paolo Melindi-Ghidi & Thomas Seegmuller, 2023. "The dynamics of fertility under environmental concerns," Working Papers hal-04305062, HAL.
    12. Sara Bisi & Jan Van Bavel & Nadia Sturm, 2024. "Climate change and fertility desires: An experimental study among university students in Belgium and Italy," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 51(2), pages 17-48.

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