Psychometric properties of the German Hogg Eco-Anxiety scale and its associations with psychological distress, self-efficacy and social support.

Summary: Have you ever felt deeply worried about climate change and the environment? Scientists call this feeling "eco-anxiety." To study it better, researchers translated a well-known test called the Hogg Eco-Anxiety Scale into German. They gave it to 322 people online to see if it worked accurately.

The results showed that the test is excellent! It successfully measures four main areas: feelings of worry, thinking about it too much, changing habits, and fear for the future. They also discovered that people who already experience general mental stress are the most likely to have high eco-anxiety. Thanks to this study, doctors and scientists now have a highly reliable tool to understand and measure eco-worry in German speakers.