EcoARology: Using AR to empower children in the face of climate change

Climate change is often presented to children within narratives that seem disconnected from their daily lives. This distancing can compromise their sense of agency towards it potentially leading to anxiety, a sense of helplessness, or disdain. Our research addresses this disconnection by exploring the use of Augmented Reality (AR) to reveal subtle, yet critical, impacts of climate change on local species interactions. We specifically explore “phenological mismatches”, which occur when species seasonal patterns change, causing species that typically rely on them to fall out of sync, compromising their very survival. Such phenomena are becoming increasingly common due to climate-induced changes in environmental cues. To engage children with such subtle and yet pervasive climate-change phenomena in an accessible way, we developed “EcoARology,” a probe app that illustrates such phenomena while connecting it to children's environments and species that they are likely to be familiar with, ultimately giving them tools to discuss and explore actions within their own scope of agency. Workshops with 17 children and 13 caregivers revealed the ways the tool prompted conversations and how a sense of agency changed as 1) children and caregivers transitioned from fantastical to realistic ideas and, 2) from personal daily actions to broader climate issues. The work highlights the potential of AR as a tool to foster a sense of connection with climate change issues and its pivotal role in enhancing children's understanding and empathy towards these issues.