Interactions between concerns for the environment and other sources of concern in 31 European countries

Understanding how different sources of concern interact in people's mind is a question that has entertained generations of scholars. The finite-pool-of-worry (FPW) hypothesis states that humans have limited resources to worry, thus when they are worried about one issue they become less worried about other issues. Instead, the affect-generalization theory (AGT) posits that an increased level of worry about one threat increases concerns about related threats. Understanding how concerns for the environment interact with concerns for other sources of worry is extremely useful in the fight against global warming. To this end, we adopt a Lotka-Volterra model to detect instances of AGT and FPW among worries for the environment, economy, safety, social issues and immigration in 31 European countries between 2012--2019 (Eurobarometer data). Our findings suggest that, consistently with AGT, an increase in the concerns for the environment often favors the growth of concerns for the economy. Meanwhile, consistently with FPW, an increase in the concerns for the economy, but also for the other sources of concern, often pushes down concerns for the environment. Moreover, we find that an increase in concerns for immigration and social issues generally pushes down concerns for the environment. Furthermore, we find that AGT and FPW can coexist not only over time and across countries, but also as a result of an asymmetric interaction. Building on our results, we hypothesize the existence of a pyramid of worries. At the bottom of the pyramid lie worries like concerns for the economy, which generally predate other worries. Concerns for the environment lie at the very top of the pyramid as they are generally predated by other worries.Building on our results, we hypothesize the existence of a pyramid of worries. At the bottom of the pyramid lie worries like concerns for the economy, which generally predate other worries.