Capstone Title: Panpsychist Perspectives of Public Health Ethics: Applications to Climate Change and Behavioral Health Frameworks

Student Concentration: Health Promotion & Behavior

Capstone Chair: Dr. Collins O Airhihenbuwa

Capstone Abstract: This perspective paper applies a panpsychist ethical lens to the public health response to anthropogenic global climate change by deconstructing dominant conceptualizations of consciousness and time. A multidisciplinary review of the field’s response to the crisis argues that the philosophical underpinnings of modern scientific logic and the ethos surrounding it naturally give rise to panpsychist reasoning and must be more thoughtfully and thoroughly considered to address it and the disparate health outcomes it has and will produce. Lastly, panpsychist ethical reasoning applied to the Ecological Model of health behavior and the Health in All Policies framework reveals how these paradigms benefit from expansive definitions of consciousness and temporality and argues that to address climate change these models must prioritize intergenerational and interspecies health and justice, along with a truly planetary ethic.