NASA’s “Climate Kids” page tells young children that the Earth is undergoing global temperature changes that could affect their lives.
The agency’s program features a “Guide to Climate Change for Kids,” wherein children learn that the earth is warming due to the “destruction of forests and burning fossil fuels.”
In a section explaining fossil fuels, NASA calls “global warming” the “biggest problem of all.”
Other resources in the “Climate Kids” program are “What Can Trees Tell Us About Climate Change?” “How Does Climate Change Affect the Ocean?” and “What Can We Do to Slow Down Climate Change?”
“Earth’s climate is warming due to human activities,” another section of the website states. “As Earth experiences a warming climate, we experience hotter air temperatures. The ocean does an excellent job of absorbing the extra heat from the atmosphere, delaying the full impact of global warming.”
According to the Washington Free Beacon, the program was developed under the Obama administration. The interactive website is now featured under NASA’s “Games and Interactions.”
The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) asserts so-called climate change impacts children’s emotional development.
“Children, including adolescents under the age of 18, are often more vulnerable than the general population to the health impacts of climate change,” according to the EPA, explaining that “Children are developing emotionally, as their brains continue to grow throughout adolescence. Children can experience mental health impacts from major storms, fires, and other extreme events that are expected to increase with a changing climate. They also can suffer from other changes, such as having to move due to climate threats.”
A Harvard study published in the journal Nature similarly claimed that “climate change” negatively affects mental health.
The study used participant testimonials for data, assessing “how people are struggling with worries about their future, and the impact of specific ecosystems on communities that rely very intimately on those ecosystems.”
According to the study, negative emotions such as worry, grief, and frustration emerge when considering long-term climate change.
