Homelessness and Climate Harm: Psychological Perspectives
- Climate and environment
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The BPS South West Branch and DCP South West branch invite you to join us to learn together and to consider how we can build climate awareness into our professional practice and future research.
You'll learn and how to build climate awareness into your professional practice and future research.
Psychologists have a lot to learn, and to contribute, through engaging with the suffering and resourcefulness of those in the UK, and beyond, who have done least to cause environmental harm.
The people are already experiencing the worst of its effects and are facing worse in the future.
Register now to book your place on this free virtual event.
Who is facing the impact of climate change?
Children and young people, everyone living in poverty, those who are rendered homeless, those who have suffered from the impacts of colonialism, people with long-term health conditions: all face the various impacts of climate change.
This includes extreme weather events, flooding, excess heat, air pollution, fuel poverty, the threat of future shocks and all the associated traumas.
Increasingly, citizens, politicians and business leaders are realising that climate and ecological harm present a serious threat to human health and well-being, as well as to that of all the other species with whom we co-exist.
Effects of the climate crisis
Climate change is causing massively increased death and suffering.
The World Health Organisation anticipates there will be a quarter of a million extra deaths per year between 2030 and 2025 from malnutrition, malaria, diarrhoea, and heat stress.
Research by our colleagues at the University of Bath has had a global impact in conveying the huge level of concern and sense of abandonment experienced by children and young people across the world in realising the uncertain and damaged future they face.
We psychologists have personal and professional responsibilities to face these threats (while recognising the huge emotional and cognitive load in doing so).
We also, more positively, must share ideas, stories, knowledge and inspiration to support the individual and systemic changes that could lead to better and fairer lives through preventing and mitigating climate harm.
18:00 - Welcome and Introduction on behalf of BPS & DCP South West Branches
- Dr Angela Carter, Chair BPS South West Branch
18:05 - Event Overview
- Dr Tony Wainwright, Event Lead
18:15 - Supporting the homeless through extreme weather events
- Bethany Camp, Trainee Clinical Psychologist
18:30 - There's always something we can do: A local response to forced displacement, climate crisis and homelessness.
- Avril Bellinger, Students & Refugees Together (START)
18.45 - The Met Office supporting vulnerable groups - including homeless people
- Helen Roberts, Socio-meteorologist, The Met Office (recorded talk)
18.50 - Breakout rooms
19.10 - Panel Q&A and General Discussion
- Bethany Camp, Avril Bellinger and Tony Wainwright
19.25 - Closing Remarks
- Dr Tony Wainwright & Dr Angela Carter
Bethany Camp - Supporting the homeless through extreme weather events
Bethany Camp is a Trainee Clinical Psychologist in her third year at the University of Liverpool. Her thesis has been exploring the trauma experiences and the Professional Quality of Life of the homelessness support sector.
She completed her MSc at Exeter University which was in Psychological Research Methods and completed her BSc at St Mary's University, Twickenham in Psychology with Nutrition.
Bethany's new post commencing in October 2023 will be focused on working with homelessness staff teams in Liverpool.
Avril Bellinger - There's always something we can do: A local response to forced displacement, climate crisis and homelessness.
Avril Bellinger is the founder of Students and Refugees Together (START).
Avril is also the Elder in Residence, UNESCO Chair - Refugee Integration through Languages and the Arts (RILA), University of Glasgow, an Honorary Associate Professor in Social Work, University of Plymouth and co-author of The Strengths Approach in Practice: How It Changes Lives.
Helen Roberts - The Met Office supporting vulnerable groups - including homeless people
Helen Roberts joined the Met Office as a trainee weather forecaster in 2003, and spent much of her career as an Operational Meteorologist working in a variety of sectors, including military, aviation, transport, retail and media. She worked as a TV weather presenter for BBC Spotlight for around four years, and co-hosts the Met Office podcast 'Mostly Weather'.
Having recently completed an MSc in psychology, Helen is the UK's first Socio-Meteorologist, working at the intersection of the social and physical sciences in order to ensure weather forecasts and warnings help people make better decisions to stay safe and thrive. She is especially interested in communication that encourages behavioural response, with a particular focus on equipping people to prepare for and respond to extreme and impactful weather that is being exacerbated by our changing climate.
Helen studied Post Traumatic Stress Disorder resulting from natural disasters for her MSc dissertation, with one of the key findings being that PTSD, and mental ill health more generally, can be exacerbated when a disaster is attributed to humans rather than completely natural causes. This has significant implications for human-induced climate change increasing so called natural disasters. The research also highlighted that those who are displaced after a natural disaster are more likely to experience PTSD, particularly those whose social networks are disrupted.
Other relevant areas of research at the Met Office include better understanding vulnerable audiences, and how we might ensure forecasts and warnings reach the homeless community, as well a project on human habitability and the impacts of climate change. This work aims to explore the limits of human habitability in relation to climate change and the ability of mitigation actions to enhance human habitability, focussing on collaboration and a co-production approach. The work is investigating two sides of the same coin, the limits for life to survive or life to thrive i.e., the limits of human habitability and pathways that enhance human habitability (co-benefits of climate mitigation and adaptation actions).