“That Is Not My Problem!”: Utilizing the Concept of Psychological Distance in Environmental and Health Education

“Bed bugs live in dirty places”—How Using Live Animals in Teaching Contributes to Reducing Stigma, Disgust, Psychological Stigma, and Misinformation in Students

“…Psychological distance has been identified as an emerging target in biology education, because it has repeatedly been associated with proactive outcomes, such as preventive behavior ( Büssing and Heuckmann, 2021 ). In the present study, we identified a prevention success, because students became more conscious of the topic of bed bugs and were less accepting of common bed bug myths.…”

“…Empirical data showed that lower psychological distance corresponded to greater motivation to adhere to protective measures and engagement in proactive behaviors of disease prevention ( Blauza et al. , 2021 ; Büssing and Heuckmann, 2021 ). Thus, challenging one’s psychological distance by classroom activities in general might also offer a potential route for targeted intervention of an individual’s perception of stigma and disgust.…”

«Let’s Go Deep into the Game to Save Our Planet!» How an Immersive and Educational Video Game Reduces Psychological Distance and Raises Awareness

“…This research assumes that manipulating the different characteristics of the game would promote the immersion of players, thus reflecting their commitment and an emotional attachment to what the game environment offers to them [79,80]. It also assumes that this affectivity coupled with the cognitive reflections aroused by game elements would promote the learning of players to the point of questioning their behavior and adopting a more pro-environmental attitude as we have seen in recent studies [25,49] along with the fact that psychological distance is considered relevant in education [81]. This study [25] also assumes the possible need to know the motivations of the participants, because we know, for example, that a person's living environment greatly influences their interest in environmental causes [82].…”

Bildung für nachhaltige Entwicklung – Impulse zu Digitalisierung, Inklusion und Klimaschutz

“…So ist davon auszugehen, dass Schulklassen und speziell das Klassenklima einen großen Einfluss auf das emotionale Erleben besitzen (Bellocchi et al 2014). Einen wichtigen Faktor könnte überdies die empfundene Distanz zum Klimawandel darstellen, welche mit dem Konstrukt der psychologischen Distanz operationalisiert werden kann (Büssing/ Heuckmann 2021). Dabei zeigen vorhergehende Studien, dass Menschen große Unterschiede in der Betroffenheit vom Klimawandel zeigen (McDonald/Chai/ Newell 2015).…”

“…Insbesondere Lernende mit einer großen Nähe -und folglich einer geringen Distanz -könnten sehr emotional reagieren. Geeignet ausgewählte Beiträge aus sozialen Medien könnten dann wiederum genutzt werden, um eine Betroffenheit bei anderen Lernenden zu erhöhen, zum Beispiel wenn sich diese nicht von den Auswirkungen des Klimawandels betroffen fühlen (Büssing/ Heuckmann 2021).…”