{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,7,27]],"date-time":"2026-07-27T05:00:28Z","timestamp":1785128428270,"version":"3.55.0"},"reference-count":26,"publisher":"Frontiers Media SA","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2026,7,27]],"date-time":"2026-07-27T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1785110400000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":["frontiersin.org"],"crossmark-restriction":true},"short-container-title":["Front. Psychol."],"abstract":"<jats:sec>\n                    <jats:title>Introduction<\/jats:title>\n                    <jats:p>Climate change anxiety is increasingly recognized as an important psychological response to the climate crisis among young adults, but its link to climate-related behaviors remains unclear.<\/jats:p>\n                  <\/jats:sec>\n                  <jats:sec>\n                    <jats:title>Methods<\/jats:title>\n                    <jats:p>\n                      Using the four-factor Climate Anxiety Scale (CAS), this secondary analysis of a public dataset examined whether cognitive-emotional difficulties, functional impairment, personal experience with climate change, and behavioral engagement predicted pro-environmental behavior (PEB) and perceived barriers to climate action in a sample of American university students (\n                      <jats:italic>N<\/jats:italic>\n                      =\u202f435; ages 18\u201322; 72.6% female). Composite scores derived from five PEB categories and five barrier categories were analyzed with Poisson regression, complemented by binomial sensitivity analyses.\n                    <\/jats:p>\n                  <\/jats:sec>\n                  <jats:sec>\n                    <jats:title>Results<\/jats:title>\n                    <jats:p>\n                      Both Poisson models were significant [PEB: LR\n                      <jats:italic>\u03c7<\/jats:italic>\n                      <jats:sup>2<\/jats:sup>\n                      (4)\u202f=\u202f62.57,\n                      <jats:italic>p<\/jats:italic>\n                      &amp;lt;\u202f0.001; perceived barriers: LR\n                      <jats:italic>\u03c7<\/jats:italic>\n                      <jats:sup>2<\/jats:sup>\n                      (4)\u202f=\u202f46.32,\n                      <jats:italic>p<\/jats:italic>\n                      &amp;lt;\u202f0.001], and behavioral engagement was the only significant predictor in each (IRRs\u202f=\u202f1.049 and 1.035, respectively). In sex-stratified models, behavioral engagement predicted PEB among females, whereas personal experience predicted PEB among males; behavioral engagement predicted perceived barriers in both groups. Binomial sensitivity analyses largely confirmed these patterns, with behavioral engagement the most consistent predictor across outcomes, sexes, and analytic approaches.\n                    <\/jats:p>\n                  <\/jats:sec>\n                  <jats:sec>\n                    <jats:title>Discussion<\/jats:title>\n                    <jats:p>Together, these findings suggest that it is the behavioral and motivational components of the CAS, rather than climate anxiety as a global construct, that are most consistently associated with PEB and barrier awareness. By contrast, the distress-related dimensions showed little independent association with either outcome apart from a small model-dependent association between Cognitive\u2013Emotional Difficulties and PEB in the binomial sensitivity analyses. These findings underscore the value of treating climate anxiety as a multidimensional construct in research and intervention efforts aimed at translating climate concern into sustained action.<\/jats:p>\n                  <\/jats:sec>","DOI":"10.3389\/fpsyg.2026.1889006","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2026,7,27]],"date-time":"2026-07-27T04:24:45Z","timestamp":1785126285000},"update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3389\/crossmark-policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":0,"title":["Climate anxiety, pro-environmental behavior, and perceived barriers in university students: analysis of a publicly available dataset from the United States"],"prefix":"10.3389","volume":"17","author":[{"given":"Fanni","family":"K\u00fcplen","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Psychology and Health Management, Faculty of Health and Sport Sciences, Sz\u00e9chenyi Istv\u00e1n University","place":["Gy\u0151r, Hungary"]}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Ang\u00e9la","family":"Somogyi","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Psychology and Health Management, Faculty of Health and Sport Sciences, Sz\u00e9chenyi Istv\u00e1n University","place":["Gy\u0151r, Hungary"]}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Robert","family":"Podstawski","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Physiotherapy, University of Warmia and Mazury in Olsztyn","place":["Olsztyn, Poland"]}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Celal","family":"Bulgay","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Faculty of Sport Sciences, Bing\u00f6l University","place":["Bing\u00f6l, T\u00fcrkiye"]}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Attila","family":"Szabo","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Psychology and Health Management, Faculty of Health and Sport Sciences, Sz\u00e9chenyi Istv\u00e1n University","place":["Gy\u0151r, Hungary"]}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"1965","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2026,7,27]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref1","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"569","DOI":"10.1016\/S2215-0366(14)00080-7","article-title":"The new life stage of emerging adulthood at ages 18\u201329 years: implications for mental health","volume":"1","author":"Arnett","year":"2014","journal-title":"Lancet Psychiatry"},{"key":"ref2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"14","DOI":"10.1016\/j.jenvp.2006.12.002","article-title":"Twenty years after Hines, Hungerford, and Tomera: a new meta-analysis of psycho-social determinants of pro-environmental behaviour","volume":"27","author":"Bamberg","year":"2007","journal-title":"J. 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