Climate change is poised to completely upend life in Japan. Rising temperatures and an increasing frequency of heavy rains, high waves and storm surges spells disaster for the island nation, which will be subject to increases in heat stroke cases, declines in water and rice quality, an expansion in the distributions of agricultural pests, and an increased risk of drought (Japan Weather Association, 2013). 

While this list may sound terrible enough, it does not even include perhaps the worst effect: the severe deterioration of the mental health of the citizenry, a product of the trauma induced by the extreme weather events associated with climate change and their physical impacts. 

The means by which climate change will wreak such havoc? The natural environment. Water, air, plants, and animals are instruments of destruction in its hands, the tools with which climate change does its work.

It wasn’t always this way.

Up until now, the natural environment has served as a boon for mental health. My research will explore how the role of nature in the mental wellbeing of the Japanese populace will reverse with the advent of climate change; how the psychological benefits once afforded by the natural environment will be supplanted by severe damages to the human psyche.

Sources will include writings on the past and current nature immersion practices in Japan, the proven psychological benefits of such activities, the various means that climate change will ravage Japan through the natural elements, and the detrimental effects these will have on the psyche of the people. 

References

Japan Weather Association (Ed.). (2013). Climate Change and Its Impacts in Japan (FY2012). In Ministry of the Environment. Global Environment Bureau, Ministry of the Environment. https://www.env.go.jp/en/earth/cc/impacts_FY2012.pdf