Environmental Psychology

Environmental challenges such as climate change, pollution, urbanization, and biodiversity loss are not just environmental problems—they are fundamentally human behaviour problems. Understanding why people think, feel, and act the way they do is essential for creating meaningful and lasting environmental change. This course introduces you to the fascinating field of Environmental Psychology and explores how psychological science can help address some of today's most pressing sustainability challenges. You'll discover how environments shape our thoughts, emotions, identities, and everyday decisions, and why awareness alone is often not enough to change behaviour. Drawing on engaging examples and real-world case studies from both the Global North and Global South, you'll explore topics such as environmental perception, place attachment, climate anxiety, environmental justice, behavioural economics, nudging, sustainable decision-making, and systems thinking. You'll also learn how these ideas are applied in urban planning, public policy, climate communication, public health, and environmental governance. Whether you're a student, educator, researcher, policymaker, sustainability professional, or simply passionate about creating a more sustainable future, this course will equip you with practical, evidence-based tools to understand environmental behaviour and design effective interventions for real-world challenges. By the end of this course, you will be able to: 1) Explain how environments shape human thoughts, emotions, and behaviour. 2) Understand the psychological drivers of sustainable and unsustainable actions. 3) Evaluate the impacts of environmental change on well-being and society. 4) Apply behavioural science to design evidence-based sustainability interventions, policies, and environments. 5) Critically analyse environmental challenges from both psychological and systems perspectives