The word solastalgia is a fusion of solace and the Greek suffix for pain, algia. According to some experts, it may also help explain the harmful effects of climate change on mental health.

Coined in 2003 by Australian philosopher Glenn Albrecht, the term refers to human distress caused by environmental changes to one’s home or surroundings, leading to a loss or lack of solace and resulting in feelings of pain or sickness.

“Albrecht’s idea builds off Sigmund Freud’s classic 1919 essay, ‘Das Unheimliche,’ which argues that anxiety relies on an element he called the ‘unheimliche’ — translated as ‘un-homelike’ or ‘uncanny,’” Jacob Lee, MD, chair of the American Psychiatric Association (APA) Committee on Climate Change and Mental Health, told Medscape Medical News.

“Freud argued that seeing familiar objects or environments become unfamiliar was deeply unsettling and could sometimes challenge one’s beliefs about themselves,” Lee noted.

And unlike nostalgia, which can be relieved by going home, solastalgia arises because home itself has changed.

What Is Solastalgia?

Although not considered to be a mental health problem, solastalgia is “a useful term for recognizing the emotions associated with loss or damage to places that are personally significant,” Susan Clayton, PhD, professor and chair of psychology, The College of Wooster, Wooster, Ohio, told Medscape Medical News.

However, Clayton doesn’t think it should be considered as a mental health problem but rather as a “source of stress that contributes to mental health problems; just as grief about the loss of a loved one is not a mental health problem, but people can still benefit from help in coping with those emotions.”

In a recent scoping review published online in BMJ Mental Health, researchers from Switzerland combed the literature for studies looking at the relationship between solastalgia and mental health issues. Out of an initial haul of 80 studies, 19 were included in the review, drawing on data on more than 5000 participants in Australia, Germany, Peru, and the US.

The five quantitative studies included in the analysis consistently revealed positive associations between solastalgia and mental health problems, including depression, anxiety, posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and somatization.

The 14 qualitative studies in the review backed up the findings of the quantitative studies, providing further evidence that solastalgia is a “useful construct to understand the emotional responses of persons affected by environmental changes,” the researchers wrote.

“In general, the findings were very much in line with what we expected,” Susanne Fischer, PhD, assistant professor of planetary health, University of St. Gallen, St. Gallen, and Institute of Psychology, University of Zurich, Zurich, both in Switzerland, who worked on the review, told Medscape Medical News.

“People with a lot of place-based feelings of loss were more likely to also have mental health problems.”

Ongoing Environmental Harm vs Natural Disasters

The strength of the associations Fischer and her colleagues observed wasn’t as strong for responses to natural disasters as it was for those associated with ongoing environmental destruction.

“This suggests that solastalgia might either be more intense or salient in scenarios of ongoing environmental destruction as opposed to one-time events, or in scenarios, which are clearly human-made and not attributable to any other causes (eg, the weather instead of climate change),” they wrote.

“This notion fits in well with long-standing evidence in trauma research, according to which interpersonal traumas are most likely to cause PTSD,” they explained.

For example, residents exposed to the 2019/2020 Australian “Black Summer” fires who reported high solastalgia were twice as likely to screen positive for depression or suicidal ideation 6 months later, one study reported.

And a comprehensive review by the Department of Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, highlighted how prolonged wildfire smoke exposure, and being forced indoors, can contribute to stress, depression, heightened anxiety, isolation/loneliness, and the development of solastalgia.

Some people might be more vulnerable than others to emotional distress caused by climate change, Clayton said.

Individuals who feel a stronger sense of connection or attachment to the natural world have experienced direct impacts of climate change or feel more vulnerable due to where they live may experience greater stress. People who hear more about climate change in the media, older adolescents and young adults, and women may also be more vulnerable, some research has shown.

How Is Solastalgia Measured?

Several scales for measuring solastalgia have been developed and validated, including the Environmental Distress Scale (EDS), the Scale of Solastalgia, and the Brief Solastalgia Scale, a nine-item subscale of the EDS.

The fact that the findings in their review were “so consistent” suggests that these scales work and there could be “great value” in assessing solastalgia in residents of areas that undergo significant environmental change, Fischer said.

“Both short questionnaires and in-depth interviews appear to be suitable to assess solastalgia. The former are very economical and could thus easily be used in clinical practice,” she noted.

Is Solastalgia Recognized by Clinicians?

While solastalgia is not formally recognized as a mental health condition, the Climate Psychiatry Alliance uses solastalgia to train clinicians on place-based grief and lists it among key climate emotions.

It’s clear from research that most people, especially younger people, around the world are worried about climate change, Lee said.

“They see the frequency of natural disasters increasing in real time before their eyes and wonder what their homeland will look like by the time they’re considering kids of their own,” Lee said.

“Increasingly, psychiatrists trained to help with disasters see a need for awareness about the risks our changing climate pose,” he said.

That interest is reflected, in part, by the inclusion of multiple presentations on climate change and mental health at the APA annual meeting.

“A growing body of literature now advises mental health workers on how to build resilience in our patients and communities,” Lee added.

Can Solastalgia Be Treated?

Research on potential ways to ease solastalgia is limited, but some research suggests that cognitive behavioral therapies will be helpful with climate anxiety, Clayton said.

“In a more general way, social connections and getting involved in actions to address climate change may help to keep climate change anxiety from undermining mental health,” she noted.

Solastalgia is one of several “eco-emotions,” such as eco-anxiety, eco-grief, or eco-shame/-guilt, which might be important in explaining mental health problems arising from ecological crises, Fischer and her colleagues explained in their recent review.

Identifying an individual’s eco-emotions and acting upon them could be helpful, Fischer told Medscape Medical News.

“For instance, someone experiencing high levels of ecological grief might find that restoring or conserving nature is helpful in regulating these emotions and in preventing mental health problems,” she said.

“As clinicians, we are used to asking patients about their social environment — family, friends, partners, and other significant people. I do think that mental health professionals might be well advised to ask more about natural environmental factors as it may relate to mental health,” Fischer said.

“Clinicians might want to discuss coping strategies for someone living in an area affected by environmental damage. At the same time, spending time in nature is a powerful resource for many people, and this could certainly be emphasized and utilized more in treatment,” Fischer suggested.

The review had no specific funding. Fischer, Lee, and Clayton reported having no relevant disclosures.