Lost in between crises: How do COVID-19 threats influence the motivation to act against climate change and the refugee crisis?

While the COVID-19 pandemic has been found to undermine mental health, it is unclear how it may impact individuals’ motivation to tackle other global crises. There are at least two perspectives on how COVID-19 might psychologically impact how people respond to other global crises. The finite-pool-of-worry hypothesis suggests that worrying about one issue might diminish worry about other issues since individuals have a limited capacity of worry. Conversely, the affect-generalization hypothesis advocates that worry about an issue might generalize to other issues and increase general levels of worry. To test these competing hypotheses, the present research investigated how threats activated by the COVID-19 pandemic might affect individuals’ interest in and motivation to address climate change (Study 1) and the refugee crisis (Study 2) by assessing pro-environmental behavior and prosocial behavior toward refugees, respectively. The results showed that exposure to COVID-19 threats elevated anxiety levels, and trait anxiety, psychological distance, and future orientation moderated this effect. While COVID-19 threats did not influence pro-environmental and prosocial behavior and intentions, exploratory analyses uncovered that being psychologically closer to COVID-19 might predict an increase in pro-environmental and prosocial behavior and intentions, pointing to the affect-generalization hypothesis.