example of title research about environment

Research Topics & Ideas: Environment

100+ Environmental Science Research Topics & Ideas

Finding and choosing a strong research topic is the critical first step when it comes to crafting a high-quality dissertation, thesis or research project. Here, we’ll explore a variety research ideas and topic thought-starters related to various environmental science disciplines, including ecology, oceanography, hydrology, geology, soil science, environmental chemistry, environmental economics, and environmental ethics.

NB – This is just the start…

The topic ideation and evaluation process has multiple steps . In this post, we’ll kickstart the process by sharing some research topic ideas within the environmental sciences. This is the starting point though. To develop a well-defined research topic, you’ll need to identify a clear and convincing research gap , along with a well-justified plan of action to fill that gap.

If you’re new to the oftentimes perplexing world of research, or if this is your first time undertaking a formal academic research project, be sure to check out our free dissertation mini-course. Also be sure to also sign up for our free webinar that explores how to develop a high-quality research topic from scratch.

Overview: Environmental Topics

• Ecology /ecological science
• Atmospheric science
• Oceanography
• Soil science
• Environmental chemistry
• Environmental economics
• Environmental ethics
• Examples  of dissertations and theses

Topics & Ideas: Ecological Science

• The impact of land-use change on species diversity and ecosystem functioning in agricultural landscapes
• The role of disturbances such as fire and drought in shaping arid ecosystems
• The impact of climate change on the distribution of migratory marine species
• Investigating the role of mutualistic plant-insect relationships in maintaining ecosystem stability
• The effects of invasive plant species on ecosystem structure and function
• The impact of habitat fragmentation caused by road construction on species diversity and population dynamics in the tropics
• The role of ecosystem services in urban areas and their economic value to a developing nation
• The effectiveness of different grassland restoration techniques in degraded ecosystems
• The impact of land-use change through agriculture and urbanisation on soil microbial communities in a temperate environment
• The role of microbial diversity in ecosystem health and nutrient cycling in an African savannah

Topics & Ideas: Atmospheric Science

• The impact of climate change on atmospheric circulation patterns above tropical rainforests
• The role of atmospheric aerosols in cloud formation and precipitation above cities with high pollution levels
• The impact of agricultural land-use change on global atmospheric composition
• Investigating the role of atmospheric convection in severe weather events in the tropics
• The impact of urbanisation on regional and global atmospheric ozone levels
• The impact of sea surface temperature on atmospheric circulation and tropical cyclones
• The impact of solar flares on the Earth’s atmospheric composition
• The impact of climate change on atmospheric turbulence and air transportation safety
• The impact of stratospheric ozone depletion on atmospheric circulation and climate change
• The role of atmospheric rivers in global water supply and sea-ice formation

Topics & Ideas: Oceanography

• The impact of ocean acidification on kelp forests and biogeochemical cycles
• The role of ocean currents in distributing heat and regulating desert rain
• The impact of carbon monoxide pollution on ocean chemistry and biogeochemical cycles
• Investigating the role of ocean mixing in regulating coastal climates
• The impact of sea level rise on the resource availability of low-income coastal communities
• The impact of ocean warming on the distribution and migration patterns of marine mammals
• The impact of ocean deoxygenation on biogeochemical cycles in the arctic
• The role of ocean-atmosphere interactions in regulating rainfall in arid regions
• The impact of ocean eddies on global ocean circulation and plankton distribution
• The role of ocean-ice interactions in regulating the Earth’s climate and sea level

Tops & Ideas: Hydrology

• The impact of agricultural land-use change on water resources and hydrologic cycles in temperate regions
• The impact of agricultural groundwater availability on irrigation practices in the global south
• The impact of rising sea-surface temperatures on global precipitation patterns and water availability
• Investigating the role of wetlands in regulating water resources for riparian forests
• The impact of tropical ranches on river and stream ecosystems and water quality
• The impact of urbanisation on regional and local hydrologic cycles and water resources for agriculture
• The role of snow cover and mountain hydrology in regulating regional agricultural water resources
• The impact of drought on food security in arid and semi-arid regions
• The role of groundwater recharge in sustaining water resources in arid and semi-arid environments
• The impact of sea level rise on coastal hydrology and the quality of water resources

Topics & Ideas: Geology

• The impact of tectonic activity on the East African rift valley
• The role of mineral deposits in shaping ancient human societies
• The impact of sea-level rise on coastal geomorphology and shoreline evolution
• Investigating the role of erosion in shaping the landscape and impacting desertification
• The impact of mining on soil stability and landslide potential
• The impact of volcanic activity on incoming solar radiation and climate
• The role of geothermal energy in decarbonising the energy mix of megacities
• The impact of Earth’s magnetic field on geological processes and solar wind
• The impact of plate tectonics on the evolution of mammals
• The role of the distribution of mineral resources in shaping human societies and economies, with emphasis on sustainability

Topics & Ideas: Soil Science

• The impact of dam building on soil quality and fertility
• The role of soil organic matter in regulating nutrient cycles in agricultural land
• The impact of climate change on soil erosion and soil organic carbon storage in peatlands
• Investigating the role of above-below-ground interactions in nutrient cycling and soil health
• The impact of deforestation on soil degradation and soil fertility
• The role of soil texture and structure in regulating water and nutrient availability in boreal forests
• The impact of sustainable land management practices on soil health and soil organic matter
• The impact of wetland modification on soil structure and function
• The role of soil-atmosphere exchange and carbon sequestration in regulating regional and global climate
• The impact of salinization on soil health and crop productivity in coastal communities

Topics & Ideas: Environmental Chemistry

• The impact of cobalt mining on water quality and the fate of contaminants in the environment
• The role of atmospheric chemistry in shaping air quality and climate change
• The impact of soil chemistry on nutrient availability and plant growth in wheat monoculture
• Investigating the fate and transport of heavy metal contaminants in the environment
• The impact of climate change on biochemical cycling in tropical rainforests
• The impact of various types of land-use change on biochemical cycling
• The role of soil microbes in mediating contaminant degradation in the environment
• The impact of chemical and oil spills on freshwater and soil chemistry
• The role of atmospheric nitrogen deposition in shaping water and soil chemistry
• The impact of over-irrigation on the cycling and fate of persistent organic pollutants in the environment

Topics & Ideas: Environmental Economics

• The impact of climate change on the economies of developing nations
• The role of market-based mechanisms in promoting sustainable use of forest resources
• The impact of environmental regulations on economic growth and competitiveness
• Investigating the economic benefits and costs of ecosystem services for African countries
• The impact of renewable energy policies on regional and global energy markets
• The role of water markets in promoting sustainable water use in southern Africa
• The impact of land-use change in rural areas on regional and global economies
• The impact of environmental disasters on local and national economies
• The role of green technologies and innovation in shaping the zero-carbon transition and the knock-on effects for local economies
• The impact of environmental and natural resource policies on income distribution and poverty of rural communities

Topics & Ideas: Environmental Ethics

• The ethical foundations of environmentalism and the environmental movement regarding renewable energy
• The role of values and ethics in shaping environmental policy and decision-making in the mining industry
• The impact of cultural and religious beliefs on environmental attitudes and behaviours in first world countries
• Investigating the ethics of biodiversity conservation and the protection of endangered species in palm oil plantations
• The ethical implications of sea-level rise for future generations and vulnerable coastal populations
• The role of ethical considerations in shaping sustainable use of natural forest resources
• The impact of environmental justice on marginalized communities and environmental policies in Asia
• The ethical implications of environmental risks and decision-making under uncertainty
• The role of ethics in shaping the transition to a low-carbon, sustainable future for the construction industry
• The impact of environmental values on consumer behaviour and the marketplace: a case study of the ‘bring your own shopping bag’ policy

Examples: Real Dissertation & Thesis Topics

While the ideas we’ve presented above are a decent starting point for finding a research topic, they are fairly generic and non-specific. So, it helps to look at actual dissertations and theses to see how this all comes together.

Below, we’ve included a selection of research projects from various environmental science-related degree programs to help refine your thinking. These are actual dissertations and theses, written as part of Master’s and PhD-level programs, so they can provide some useful insight as to what a research topic looks like in practice.

• The physiology of microorganisms in enhanced biological phosphorous removal (Saunders, 2014)
• The influence of the coastal front on heavy rainfall events along the east coast (Henson, 2019)
• Forage production and diversification for climate-smart tropical and temperate silvopastures (Dibala, 2019)
• Advancing spectral induced polarization for near surface geophysical characterization (Wang, 2021)
• Assessment of Chromophoric Dissolved Organic Matter and Thamnocephalus platyurus as Tools to Monitor Cyanobacterial Bloom Development and Toxicity (Hipsher, 2019)
• Evaluating the Removal of Microcystin Variants with Powdered Activated Carbon (Juang, 2020)
• The effect of hydrological restoration on nutrient concentrations, macroinvertebrate communities, and amphibian populations in Lake Erie coastal wetlands (Berg, 2019)
• Utilizing hydrologic soil grouping to estimate corn nitrogen rate recommendations (Bean, 2019)
• Fungal Function in House Dust and Dust from the International Space Station (Bope, 2021)
• Assessing Vulnerability and the Potential for Ecosystem-based Adaptation (EbA) in Sudan’s Blue Nile Basin (Mohamed, 2022)
• A Microbial Water Quality Analysis of the Recreational Zones in the Los Angeles River of Elysian Valley, CA (Nguyen, 2019)
• Dry Season Water Quality Study on Three Recreational Sites in the San Gabriel Mountains (Vallejo, 2019)
• Wastewater Treatment Plan for Unix Packaging Adjustment of the Potential Hydrogen (PH) Evaluation of Enzymatic Activity After the Addition of Cycle Disgestase Enzyme (Miessi, 2020)
• Laying the Genetic Foundation for the Conservation of Longhorn Fairy Shrimp (Kyle, 2021).

Looking at these titles, you can probably pick up that the research topics here are quite specific and narrowly-focused , compared to the generic ones presented earlier. To create a top-notch research topic, you will need to be precise and target a specific context with specific variables of interest . In other words, you’ll need to identify a clear, well-justified research gap.

Need more help?

If you’re still feeling a bit unsure about how to find a research topic for your environmental science dissertation or research project, be sure to check out our private coaching services below, as well as our Research Topic Kickstarter .

Need a helping hand?

You Might Also Like:

research topics on climate change and environment

I wish to learn things in a more advanced but simple way and with the hopes that I am in the right place.

Thank so much for the research topics. It really helped

the guides were really helpful

Research topics on environmental geology

Thanks for the research topics….I need a research topic on Geography

I want the research on environmental planning and management

I want a topic on environmental sustainability

It good coaching

Submit a Comment Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.

• Print Friendly

• Research Paper Guides
• Research Paper Topics

Environmental Research Topics: 235 Ideas for Students

• Speech Topics
• Basics of Essay Writing
• Essay Topics
• Other Essays
• Main Academic Essays
• Basics of Research Paper Writing
• Miscellaneous
• Chicago/ Turabian
• Data & Statistics
• Methodology
• Admission Writing Tips
• Admission Advice
• Other Guides
• Student Life
• Studying Tips
• Understanding Plagiarism
• Academic Writing Tips
• Basics of Dissertation & Thesis Writing

• Essay Guides
• Formatting Guides
• Basics of Research Process
• Admission Guides
• Dissertation & Thesis Guides

Table of contents

Use our free Readability checker

Are you looking for environmental research paper topics? With ongoing debates about global warming, air pollution, and other issues, there is no shortage of exciting topics to craft a research paper around. Whether you’re studying ecology, geology, or marine biology, developing the perfect environmental research topic to get your science research assignment off the ground can be challenging. Stop worrying – we got you covered. Continue reading to learn about 235 different ideas on environmental research topics. In this article, we will discuss environmental topics and show you how to choose an interesting research topic for your subject. We will also provide a list of various environmental topics from our research paper services . In addition, we will present you with environmental science research topics, discuss other ideas about the environment for research papers, and offer our final thoughts on these topics for research papers.

What Are Environmental Topics?

Environmental topics provide an analysis of environmental issues and their effect on people, culture, nature, or a particular place, often interdisciplinary, drawing from sciences, politics, economics, sociology, and public policy. Topics about environmental science may include environmental justice, engineering and communication, regulation, economics, and health. Environment research topics may focus on environmental sustainability, impact assessment, management systems, and resources. In addition, these areas for research papers offer a few opportunities to explore our relationship with the environment and consider how human activities influence it through climate change, pollution, or other factors such as natural resource usage as well as biodiversity loss.

What Makes a Good Environmental Research Topic? 

When choosing an environmental research topic, it is essential to consider what makes good environmental topics. Below is an expert list outlining what your topic should be like:

• It should be interesting and relevant to your study field.
• It's essential to consider the topic's potential implications on environment-related policies. Think about the possible positive or negative effects this topic could have when implemented in terms of protecting our environment.
• A good topic should be specific enough to provide a focus for your research paper and allow you to explore a particular issue in depth.
• The research topic should be feasible and manageable to ensure that you can find the necessary information and resources.
• Environmental sciences research topics should be current and relevant to ecological developments.

How to Choose Environmental Science Topics?

When choosing research topics for environmental science, it is essential to research the available information and determine its relevance. It all depends on whether the research topic is feasible and has the potential for exploration. Environmental issue topics should be well-defined and interesting to the researcher. The reason is that the researcher should be able to provide solutions or make suggestions on improvement strategies. You can follow the below steps when choosing environmental science topics for research:

Step 1: Identify topics that are relevant to your research context. Step 2: Develop a list of research areas by extracting critical concepts from the available literature.

Step 3: Select interesting and feasible topics by considering the methods available for analysis.

Step 4: Analyze these topics to identify the gaps in current research and formulate questions for further investigation. Step 5: Review the available literature to gain insights about the chosen topic and develop a research proposal.

Step 6: Consult experts in this field to get feedback and refine the proposed research.

Don’t have time for writing your environmental research paper? Count on StudyCrumb. Send us a ‘ write a research paper for me ’ message and get professional assistance in a timely manner. 

List of Environment Research Paper Topics

Environmental topics for a research paper can be overwhelming to navigate due to the vast number of issues you can discuss in your article. To help narrow down your research paper search, below is a list of environmental research topics that include climate change, renewable energy, ecology, pollution, sustainability, endangered species, ecosystems, nature, and water management. You can choose one of them as a guide to writing an excellent essay

Environmental Research Topics on Climate Change

Climate change is one of the most pressing issues that humanity is currently facing due to increased temperature levels. Climate change is amongst the most debated environmental research topics among researchers, policymakers, and governments. Here are critical areas related to climate change that you can use for your environmental science research paper topics:

• Causes and effects of climate change.
• Climate change adaptation strategies.
• Climate change impact on rural communities.
• Role of renewable energy sources in mitigating climate change.
• Carbon dioxide emission policies.
• Global warming and its impact on ocean acidification.
• Social effects of climate change.
• Permafrost melting and its implications.
• Role of international organizations in climate change.
• Climate change and forest fire: examining the role of climate change on wildfire season, frequency, and burned area.

Environmental Science Research Topics on Renewable Energy

Renewable energy is essential due to its potential to reduce ecological damage from burning fossil fuels and provides valuable topics in environmental science. You can use renewable energy technologies as a cleaner alternative for generating electricity and heating. In addition, renewable energy is crucial for cooling homes and factories in the world. The following are environmental science topics for research paper on renewable energy:

• Renewable energy types, sources, and their impact on the environment.
• Economic benefits of renewable energy.
• Research on new technologies in renewable energy.
• Role of renewable energy in protecting businesses from legal actions.
• Hydropower and its role in renewable energy.
• Chemical batteries for renewable energy storage.
• Green microgrids in optimizing renewable energy usage.
• Ocean energy and its effects on the environment.
• Geothermal drilling and its consequences.
• Biomass resources and their use in renewable energy.

Environment Research Topics on Ecology

Ecology studies how living organisms interact with each other and their environment. Also, it is an important area of research for understanding how the environment affects the function of various species and ecosystems. It also gives a background for one of the best environment research paper topics. Below are topics for environmental research paper on ecology:

• Biodiversity conservation strategies.
• Impact of pollution on ecosystems.
• Ecological research on saving endangered species from extinction.
• Role of environment in migrations patterns of animals.
• Habitat fragmentation effects on the environment.
• Ecological implications of climate change.
• Ecology and pest control strategies.
• Ecological effects of deforestation.
• Ecology and conservation of marine life.
• Ecological consequences of urbanization.

Research Topics in Environmental Science About Pollution

Pollution is an issue at the forefront of scientific research. As one of the environmental science paper topics, it offers insights into how pollution destroys the environment and its negative impact on human and animal health. Stated below are hot environmental science research topics on pollution which you can use for your article:

• Air pollution: causes & effects.
• Water pollution and its consequences for people and other living organisms.
• Issue of urban & industrial pollution.
• Noise pollution and environment-related health risks.
• Marine plastic pollution in oceans.
• Radiological waste disposal policies.
• Nuclear energy, radiation & health impacts.
• Sustainable waste management solutions.
• Impact of pollution on biodiversity.
• Soil pollution and its effects on agriculture.

Environmental Topics for Research Papers on Sustainability

One of the many topics for environmental research papers is sustainability. Sustainability is an important topic to explore, as it involves finding a way for humans to reduce their ecological footprint and ensure that the environment can recover from our activities. Stated below are environmental topics for research paper on sustainability which you can explore:

• Strategies for sustainable development.
• Renewable energy sources and their effects.
• Environmental sustainability and its economic benefits.
• Sustainable energy sources and their effects.
• Implications of sustainable agriculture on the environment.
• Ecological impacts of sustainable forestry.
• Social implications of renewable energy use.
• Strategies for mitigating ecological impact from unsustainable development.
• Psychological effects of ecological awareness on sustainable practices.
• Influence of ecological sustainability on economic growth.

Environmental Topics to Write About Endangered Species

Endangered species are one of the environmental topics of great importance to research and find solutions for their conservation. Poaching, habitat destruction, and climate change negatively impact endangered species. Also, human activities have put other species at risk of extinction by competing for resources as well as introducing invasive species. Below is a list of cool environment topics to write about endangered species:

• Endangered species conservation.
• Causes & effects of habitat fragmentation.
• Wildlife conservation strategies.
• Climate change impacts on endangered species.
• Illegal wildlife trade and trafficking.
• Marine protected areas for conserving marine life.
• Ecological restoration and reintroduction programs.
• Endangered species in developing nations.
• Human rights & animal welfare laws .
• Captive breeding for conservation purposes.

Environmental Research Paper Topics on Ecosystems

Ecosystems are fascinating to explore in environmental paper topics because they contain a variety of living organisms and are a complex web of interactions between species, the environment, and humans. The subject provides environmental issues topics for research paper essential in exploring the dynamics of ecosystems and their importance. Below is a list of topics for environmental science research paper:

• Ecosystem services & their value.
• Climate change impacts on ecosystems.
• Hydrological cycle & effects on ecosystems.
• Ecological restoration & biodiversity conservation.
• Invasive species & their impact on native species.
• Biodiversity hotspots: areas of high endemism.
• Soil degradation & its impact on ecosystems.
• Sustainable forestry practices.
• Ecological restoration of wetlands.

Environmental Topics About Nature

Nature is a broad topic that includes ecological conservation, protection, and sustainability issues. Environmental research topics about nature allow us to explore areas that focus on preserving and conserving the environment. Research papers about nature can provide insight into utilizing nature as a resource, both from a practical and ecological aspect. Below is a list of environment topics that you can explore in your essays:

• Nature conservation & preservation strategies.
• Climate change effects on natural environments.
• Natural resource management strategies.
• Policies for natural resources management.
• Impact of human development on wildlands.
• Sustainable use of natural resources.
• Role of ethics in nature conservation.
• De-extinction: pros & cons of bringing back extinct species.
• Protected areas & conservation of rare species.

Environmental Issues Topics on Water Management

Water management is an issue that has a significant impact on the environment. Exploring a topic related to water management can provide experts, among others, with insights into environmental science issues and their implications. When it's time to write your project related to water management, you can explore the following topics for environmental issues:

• Water pollution & its control.
• Groundwater management strategies.
• Climate change impact on water resources.
• Integrated water resources management.
• Wetland conservation & restoration projects.
• Industrial effluents role in water pollution.
• Desalination technologies for freshwater production.
• Urbanization impact on groundwater resources.
• Inland & coastal water management strategies.
• Wastewater treatment & reuse technologies.

Environmental Science Topics in Different Areas

Environmental science studies ecological processes and their interactions with living organisms. Exploring environmental science related topics can provide valuable insights into environmental science issues, their ecological implications, and conservation efforts. In addition, these topics can also be explored in different areas, providing a comprehensive understanding of how different factors impact the environment. This section delves into various environmental science topics for projects related to law, justice, policy, economics, biology, chemistry, and health science.

Environmental Law Research Topics

Environmental law governs environmental processes and their interactions with living organisms. Delving into environmental law can uncover invaluable information on environment paper topics, ranging from legal matters and their consequences to preservation initiatives. Students can use the following environmental issue topics for research papers for their essays:

• Climate change liability & lawsuits.
• Strategies for conservation and protection under environmental law.
• Consequences of non-compliance with regulations on the environment.
• Impact of trade agreements on environment protection.
• Regulatory strategies for hazardous waste disposal.
• Strategies for enforcement and compliance with environment-related laws.
• International environment treaties and their implications.
• Effects of climate change legislation on the environment.
• Corporate environmental policies and regulations and their effects.
• Role of law in mitigating environment-related issues.

Environmental Justice Research Topics

Environmental justice seeks to ensure equitable treatment and meaningful involvement of all people in ecological protection, regardless of their race, sex, or economic status. Environment topics related to justice can provide valuable insights into ecological issues and their impacts. Listed below are justice-related Environmental topics to research:

• Implications of unequal access to resources.
• Disproportionate impacts of climate change on vulnerable populations.
• Consequences of marginalization of marginalized communities from environmental processes.
• Links between poverty and environment degradation.
• Effects of non-participation in environment-related decision-making.
• Policies to ensure access to clean air and water.
• Impact of social inequality on environment protection.
• Intersection between gender, race, and environment justice.
• Ecological consequences of corporate negligence of marginalized communities.
• Disproportionate implications of climate change on vulnerable populations.

Environmental Policy Research Paper Topics

Environmental policy is a set of laws, rules, and regulations created to protect the environment as well as its resources. Studying environment-related policies provides an area for students to explore a range of subjects related to the environment, ranging from local to global. Below are potential environmental sciences research topics for your reference.

• Environmental policy initiatives' implications on global climate change.
• Effectiveness of carbon taxes for air pollution control.
• Land use and development impact on the environment.
• Water quality in the united states, focusing on natural resource governance.
• Educational initiative's impact on public opinion and policy outcomes.
• Social aspects of policy making and implementation on the environment.
• Promoting sustainability from a global perspective.
• Potential for justice initiatives in promoting equitable and effective management.
• Rise of green economy its impact.
• Environment policies and their potential for success.

Environmental Economics Research Topics

Environmental economics seeks to understand environmental issues from an economic perspective. Examining environmental studies topics can offer insights into ecological conservation and sustainability while connecting protection efforts with economic interests and helping inform policies. The following are creative topics about environmental science related to economics:

• Economic impacts of regulating the environment.
• Strategies for environmentally sustainable economic growth.
• Consequences of non-compliance with environment-related regulations.
• Environment conservation and protection using economic incentives.
• Taxes and subsidies and their implications on the environment.
• Economic implications of climate change legislation.
• The private sector role in environment conservation and protection.
• Green finance role in mitigating ecological issues.
• Economics of pollution control and management.
• Conservation and protection of the environment in the face of economic interests.

>> Learn more: Economics Research Topics

Environmental Biology Research Topics

Environmental biology is a field of science that focuses on understanding the interactions between living organisms and their environment. It covers environmental biology topics such as biodiversity, conservation, pollution, management, health, and sustainability. The following are environment research paper topics related to biology:

• Biodiversity conservation in managing the environment.
• Role of biotechnology in reducing air pollution.
• Environment degradation and its consequences on wildlife.
• Role of microorganisms in maintaining soil fertility.
• Ecological consequences of over-exploitation of natural resources.
• Habitat fragmentation and its role in species conservation.
• Education's role in environment conservation.
• Environment degradation and its effects on food security.
• Invasive species and their impacts on ecosystem.

Keep in mind that we have a whole blog on biological topics if you need more ideas in this field.

Environmental Chemistry Research Topics

Environmental chemistry research is a complex interdisciplinary field aiming to understand the behavior of a chemical process within an environment. It involves researching the impact of pollutants in the air, soil, water, and other ecological media. Possible research topics about the environment related to this field include:

• Effect of agricultural chemicals on water systems.
• Air pollution control strategies and their effectiveness.
• Climate change impacts on aquatic ecosystems.
• Sources and implications of persistent organic pollutants.
• Air quality monitoring for urban areas.
• Water quality monitoring in coastal areas.
• Characterization and fate of toxic compounds in soil and groundwater.
• Impact of hazardous chemical waste on the environment.
• Monitoring and remediation of contaminated sites.
• The roles of environmental chemistry in climate change research.

Need more ideas? There is one more blog with  chemistry research topics  on our platform.

Environmental Health Science Research Topics

Environmental health is a diverse field focusing on the natural environment as well as its effects on human health. It is an interdisciplinary field that offers environment topics for research, such as environmental epidemiology, toxicology, and ecology, in addition to risk assessment. Provided below is a list of topics for an environmental science project that is suitable for your research paper:

• Air pollution effects on human health.
• Climate change effects on health.
• Water pollution and public health.
• Noise pollution effects on well-being.
• Mental health effects of environment-related toxins.
• Human health effects of natural disasters.
• Urbanization's effect on human health.
• Sustainable development and public health.
• Role of social media in promoting environmental health and awareness.
• Biodiversity preservation and its impact on human health.

Other Ideas & Topics About Environment for Research Papers

Ecological crisis is a key issue that has continuously affected planet earth. People are becoming more aware of environmental problems as well as their impact on health, well-being, and quality of life. As such, ecological fields for research are becoming ever more critical. This section will explore interesting environmental topics related to current ecological issues, controversial, interesting topics, easy research questions for projects, as well as unique research areas which students might study. These environmental issue project ideas below will help you develop interesting fields for research papers.

Current Issues in Environmental Science

Current ecological issues are a hot topic that has become increasingly important. They provide outstanding environmental issues to write about due to their impact on the environment and human health. The following are environmental issue topics for paper writing that are currently in discussion:

• Global warming and how to prevent its impact.
• Sustainable energy and its role in protecting the environment.
• Water conservation practices.
• Renewable energy role in global ecological protection.
• Carbon footprint and climate change.
• Ozone layer depletion and its effects on human health.
• Plastic pollution and its impact.
• Land degradation and soil erosion.
• Energy industry activities effects on ecological health.
• Air pollution and its impact on human health.
• Deforestation and its consequences.
• Effect of agricultural practices on ecological health.
• Overuse and exploitation of natural resources.
• Industrial waste impact on health.
• Green technology role in ecological protection.

Controversial Environmental Topics for Research Paper

Environmental controversies constitute a significant challenge facing society today. From climate change to air and water pollution, the effects of human activity on our natural environment are increasingly becoming a focus of public debate and research. Research papers on environmental controversial topics can help inform the public as well as policymakers about the potential impacts of human activities on the environment. The following are examples of environmental controversy topics for research paper:

• Climate change: is human activity a primary cause of global warming.
• Deforestation: are current logging practices sustainable in the long term.
• Air pollution: what are the health impacts of air pollution.
• Water pollution: how is water pollution impacting biodiversity and ecosystems.
• Geothermal energy: what potential impacts does geothermal energy extraction have on the environment.
• Renewable energy: are wind and solar energy carbon-neutral.
• Arctic drilling: is drilling for oil in the arctic ocean a viable option given current climate conditions.
• Nuclear power: what health risks are associated with nuclear power plants.
• Biodiversity loss: what steps can you take to protect biodiversity from human activities.
• Endangered species: how protecting endangered species can impact conservation efforts and how they live.
• GMO foods: are genetically modified organisms safe for human consumption? how does GMO food affect humans.
• Pesticides: how does pesticide use affect our health and the environment.
• Ocean acidification: how is ocean acidification impacting marine ecosystems.
• Waste management: what are the most effective ways to manage waste and reduce pollution.
• Resource exploitation: how does the exploitation of natural resources impact local communities.

Interesting Environmental Research Topics

In the context of environmental subjects, research topics explore the effects of human activities on the environment as well as the potential solutions to the identified problems. In addition to providing insight into ecological protection and conservation, research areas in this category cover social issues related to environmentalism and ecological justice. Below are interesting environmental science topics to consider when looking for a research topic in the future:

• Effects of environment-related toxins on human health.
• Climate change effects on coastal habitats.
• Agricultural activities impacts on the environment.
• Groundwater contamination and its effects on water quality.
• Pollution from factories and its impact on the environment.
• Waste management strategies and their impacts.
• Consequences of water contamination on local wildlife.
• Impacts of mining.
• Deforestation effects on ecosystems and species diversity.
• Industrial fishing practices effects.
• Sustainable forestry practices and their impact on ecosystems.
• Nuclear energy production and its consequences.
• Reducing emissions from vehicles and their effects on air quality.
• Landfills implications on the environment.
• Implications of plastic pollution.

Easy Environmental Research Questions for Projects

When it comes to environmental science topics for project work, there are plenty of easy options. Research projects in this category can explore ecological issues as well as their consequences or potential solutions to these problems. The following is a list of the top fifteen most accessible environment project topics for your research project.

• Air pollution levels impact on urban areas.
• Agricultural practices effects on the environment.
• Developing strategies for sustainable development.
• Causes of water contamination.
• Factors contributing to global warming.
• Natural disasters effects on the environment.
• Land use changes effects on the environment.
• Energy consumption impacts on the environment.
• Climate change effects on the environment.
• Industrialization and its consequences.
• Impact of plastic pollution.
• Health risks associated with air pollution.
• Deforestation impacts on the environment.
• Soil erosion and its effects on the environment.
• Causes and consequences of species extinction.

Unique Environmental Research Topics for Students

As environmental issues become increasingly complex, research fields for students become more varied. Unique environmental research topics for college students can range from local ecological concerns to global ones. The following are fifteen unique environmental science research topics for high school students and college students:

• Climate change impact on water quality.
• Acid rain and its effects.
• Urbanization's effect on biodiversity.
• Effects of offshore drilling.
• Ocean acidification and its impact.
• Impact of privatization on natural resources.
• Effectiveness of renewable energy sources.
• Relationship between energy consumption and the environment.
• Potential impacts regarding genetic engineering on biodiversity.
• Toxic waste disposal and its impacts.
• Environment-related policies impact on water quality.
• Deforestation and its effects on soil quality.
• Causes and consequences of ozone layer depletion.
• Relationship between pollution and public health issues.

Final Thoughts on Environmental Topics for Research Papers

This article has provided 235 environmental science research topics for research papers as well as project work that high school and college students can use. Topics range from local issues, such as assessing air pollution levels in an urban area, to global concerns, like examining the ecological effects of plastic pollution. Whether its health risks are associated with air pollution in an environment or the impacts of industrialization, research can help shape your understanding of how to protect as well as preserve our planet. It is up to the students to identify good environmental research topics that are interesting and relevant to them and to delve deeper to understand the earth better.

Get in touch with our academic writing service and receive expert help. Let us know your topic, pay for research paper and get an excellent result in no time.

Joe Eckel is an expert on Dissertations writing. He makes sure that each student gets precious insights on composing A-grade academic writing.

You may also like

Are you seeking one-on-one college counseling and/or essay support? Limited spots are now available. Click here to learn more.

50 Best Environmental Science Research Topics

May 31, 2023

Environmental science is a varied discipline that encompasses a variety of subjects, including ecology, atmospheric science, and geology among others. Professionals within this field can pursue many occupations from lab technicians and agricultural engineers to park rangers and environmental lawyers. However, what unites these careers is their focus on how the natural world and the human world interact and impact the surrounding environment. There is also one other significant commonality among environmental science careers: virtually all of them either engage in or rely on research on environmental science topics to ensure their work is accurate and up to date.

In this post, we’ll outline some of the best environmental science research topics to help you explore disciplines within environmental science and kickstart your own research. If you are considering majoring in environmental science or perhaps just need help brainstorming for a research paper, this post will give you a broad sense of timely environmental science research topics.

What makes a research topic good?

Before we dive into specific environmental science research topics, let’s first cover the basics: what qualities make for a viable research topic. Research is the process of collecting information to make discoveries and reach new conclusions. We often think of research as something that occurs in academic or scientific settings. However, everyone engages in informal research in everyday life, from reading product reviews to investigating statistics for admitted students at prospective colleges . While we all conduct research in our day-to-day lives, formal academic research is necessary to advance discoveries and scholarly discourses. Therefore, in this setting, good research hinges on a topic in which there are unanswered questions or ongoing debates. In other words, meaningful research focuses on topics where you can say something new.

However, identifying an interesting research topic is only the first step in the research process. Research topics tend to be broad in scope. Strong research is dependent on developing a specific research question, meaning the query your project will seek to answer. While there are no comprehensive guidelines for research questions, most scholars agree that research questions should be:

1) Specific

Research questions need to clearly identify and define the focus of your research. Without sufficient detail, your research will likely be too broad or imprecise in focus to yield meaningful insights. For example, you might initially be interested in addressing this question: How should governments address the effects of climate change? While that is a worthwhile question to investigate, it’s not clear enough to facilitate meaningful research. What level of government is this question referring to? And what specific effects of global warming will this research focus on? You would need to revise this question to provide a clearer focus for your research. A revised version of this question might look like this: How can state government officials in Florida best mitigate the effects of sea-level rise?

Our interest in a given topic often starts quite broad. However, it is difficult to produce meaningful, thorough research on a broad topic. For that reason, it is important that research questions be narrow in scope, focusing on a specific issue or subtopic. For example, one of the more timely environmental science topics is renewable energy. A student who is just learning about this topic might wish to write a research paper on the following question: Which form of renewable energy is best? However, that would be a difficult question to answer in one paper given the various ways in which an energy source could be “best.” Instead, this student might narrow their focus, assessing renewable energy sources through a more specific lens: Which form of renewable energy is best for job creation?

 3) Complex

As we previously discussed, good research leads to new discoveries. These lines of inquiry typically require a complicated and open-ended research question. A question that can be answered with just a “yes” or “no” (or a quick Google search) is likely indicative of a topic in which additional research is unnecessary (i.e. there is no ongoing debate) or a topic that is not well defined. For example, the following question would likely be too simple for academic research: What is environmental justice? You can look up a definition of environmental justice online. You would need to ask a more complex question to sustain a meaningful research project. Instead, you might conduct research on the following query: Which environmental issue(s) disproportionately impact impoverished communities in the Pacific Northwest? This question is narrower and more specific, while also requiring more complex thought and analysis to answer.

4) Debatable

Again, strong research provides new answers and information, which means that they must be situated within topics or discourses where there is ongoing debate. If a research question can only lead to one natural conclusion, that may indicate that it has already been sufficiently addressed in prior research or that the question is leading. For example, Are invasive species bad? is not a very debatable question (the answer is in the term “invasive species”!). A paper that focused on this question would essentially define and provide examples of invasive species (i.e. information that is already well documented). Instead, a researcher might investigate the effects of a specific invasive species. For example: How have Burmese pythons impacted ecosystems in the Everglades, and what mitigation strategies are most effective to reduce Burmese python populations?

Therefore, research topics, including environmental science topics, are those about which there are ample questions yet to be definitively answered. Taking time to develop a thoughtful research question will provide the necessary focus and structure to facilitate meaningful research.

10 Great Environmental Science Research Topics (With Explanations!)

Now that we have a basic understanding of what qualities can make or break a research topic, we can return to our focus on environmental science topics. Although “great” research topics are somewhat subjective, we believe the following topics provide excellent foundations for research due to ongoing debates in these areas, as well as the urgency of the challenges they seek to address.

1) Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation

Although climate change is now a well-known concept , there is still much to be learned about how humans can best mitigate and adapt to its effects. Mitigation involves reducing the severity of climate change. However, there are a variety of ways mitigation can occur, from switching to electric vehicles to enforcing carbon taxes on corporations that produce the highest carbon emission levels. Many of these environmental science topics intersect with issues of public policy and economics, making them very nuanced and versatile.

In comparison, climate change adaptation considers how humans can adjust to life in an evolving climate where issues such as food insecurity, floods, droughts, and other severe weather events are more frequent. Research on climate change adaptation is particularly fascinating due to the various levels at which it occurs, from federal down to local governments, to help communities anticipate and adjust to the effects of climate change.

Both climate change mitigation and adaptation represent excellent environmental science research topics as there is still much to be learned to address this issue and its varied effects.

2) Renewable Energy

Renewable energy is another fairly mainstream topic in which there is much to learn and research. Although scientists have identified many forms of sustainable energy, such as wind, solar, and hydroelectric power, questions remain about how to best implement these energy sources. How can politicians, world leaders, and communities advance renewable energy through public policy? What impact will renewable energy have on local and national economies? And how can we minimize the environmental impact of renewable energy technologies? While we have identified alternatives to fossil fuels, questions persist about the best way to utilize these technologies, making renewable energy one of the best environmental science topics to research.

3) Conservation

Conservation is a broad topic within environmental science, focusing on issues such as preserving environments and protecting endangered species. However, conservation efforts are more challenging than ever in the face of a growing world population and climate change. In fact, some scientists theorize that we are currently in the middle of a sixth mass extinction event. While these issues might seem dire, we need scientists to conduct research on conservation efforts for specific species, as well as entire ecosystems, to help combat these challenges and preserve the planet’s biodiversity.

4) Deforestation

The Save the Rainforest movement of the 1980s and 90s introduced many people to the issue of deforestation. Today, the problems associated with deforestation, such as reduced biodiversity and soil erosion, are fairly common knowledge. However, these challenges persist due, in part, to construction and agricultural development projects. While we know the effects of deforestation, it is more difficult to identify and implement feasible solutions. This is particularly true in developing countries where deforestation is often more prevalent due to political, environmental, and economic factors. Environmental science research can help reduce deforestation by identifying strategies to help countries sustainably manage their natural resources.

Environmental Science Topics (Continued)

5) urban ecology.

When we think of “the environment,” our brains often conjure up images of majestic mountain ranges and lush green forests. However, less “natural” environments also warrant study: this is where urban ecology comes in. Urban ecology is the study of how organisms interact with one another and their environment in urban settings. Through urban ecology, researchers can address topics such as how greenspaces in cities can reduce air pollution, or how local governments can adopt more effective waste management practices. As one of the newer environmental science topics, urban ecology represents an exciting research area that can help humans live more sustainably.

6) Environmental Justice

While environmental issues such as climate change impact people on a global scale, not all communities are affected equally. For example, wealthy nations tend to contribute more to greenhouse-gas emissions. However, less developed nations are disproportionately bearing the brunt of climate change . Studies within the field of environmental justice seek to understand how issues such as race, national origin, and income impact the degree to which people experience hardships from environmental issues. Researchers in this field not only document these inequities, but also identify ways in which environmental justice can be achieved. As a result, their work helps communities have access to clean, safe environments in which they can thrive.

7) Water Management

Water is, of course, necessary for life, which is why water management is so important within environmental science research topics. Water management research ensures that water resources are appropriately identified and maintained to meet demand. However, climate change has heightened the need for water management research, due to the occurrence of more severe droughts and wildfires. As a result, water management research is necessary to ensure water is clean and accessible.

8) Pollution and Bioremediation

Another impact of the increase in human population and development is heightened air, water, and soil pollution. Environmental scientists study pollutants to understand how they work and where they originate. Through their research, they can identify solutions to help address pollution, such as bioremediation, which is the use of microorganisms to consume and break down pollutants. Collectively, research on pollution and bioremediation helps us restore environments so they are sufficient for human, animal, and plant life.

9) Disease Ecology

While environmental science topics impact the health of humans, we don’t always think of this discipline as intersecting with medicine. But, believe it or not, they can sometimes overlap! Disease ecology examines how ecological processes and interactions impact disease evolution. For example, malaria is a disease that is highly dependent on ecological variables, such as temperature and precipitation. Both of these factors can help or hinder the breeding of mosquitoes and, therefore, the transmission of malaria. The risk of infectious diseases is likely to increase due to climate change , making disease ecology an important research topic.

10) Ecosystems Ecology

If nothing else, the aforementioned topics and their related debates showcase just how interconnected the world is. None of us live in a vacuum: our environment affects us just as we affect it. That makes ecosystems ecology, which examines how ecosystems operate and interact, an evergreen research topic within environmental science.

40 More Environmental Science Research Topics

Still haven’t stumbled upon the right environmental science research topic? The following ideas may help spark some inspiration:

• The effects of agricultural land use on biodiversity and ecosystems.
• The impact of invasive plant species on ecosystems.
• How wildfires and droughts shape ecosystems.
• The role of fire ecology in addressing wildfire threats.
• The impact of coral bleaching on biodiversity.
• Ways to minimize the environmental impact of clean energies.
• The effects of climate change on ocean currents and migration patterns of marine species.

Environmental Justice and Public Policy

• Opportunities to equalize the benefits of greenspaces for impoverished and marginalized communities.
• The impact of natural disasters on human migration patterns.
• The role of national parks and nature reserves in human health.
• How to address inequalities in the impact of air pollution.
• How to prevent and address the looming climate refugee crisis.
• Environmentally and economically sustainable alternatives to deforestation in less developed countries.
• Effects of environmental policies and regulations on impoverished communities.
• The role of pollutants in endocrine disruption.
• The effects of climate change on the emergence of infectious diseases.

AP Environmental Science Research Topics (Continued)

Soil science.

• Effects of climate change on soil erosion.
• The role of land management in maintaining soil health.
• Agricultural effects of salinization in coastal areas.
• The effects of climate change on agriculture.

Urban Ecology

• How road construction impacts biodiversity and ecosystems.
• The effects of urbanization and city planning on water cycles.
• Impacts of noise pollution on human health.
• The role of city planning in reducing light pollution.

Pollution and Bioremediation

• The role of bioremediation in removing “forever” chemicals from the environment.
• Impacts of air pollution on maternal health.
• How to improve plastic recycling processes.
• Individual measures to reduce consumption and creation of microplastics.
• Environmental impacts of and alternatives to fracking.

Environmental Law and Ethics

• Ethical implications of human intervention in the preservation of endangered species.
• The efficacy and impact of single-use plastic laws.
• Effects of religious and cultural values in environmental beliefs.
• The ethics of climate change policy for future generations.
• Ethical implications of international environmental regulations for less developed countries.
• The impact and efficacy of corporate carbon taxes.
• Ethical and environmental implications of fast fashion.
• The ethics and efficacy of green consumerism.
• Impacts of the hospitality and travel industries on pollution and emissions.
• The ethical implications of greenwashing in marketing.
• Effects of “Right to Repair” laws on pollution.

Final Thoughts: Environmental Science Research Topics

Environmental science is a diverse and very important area of study that impacts all aspects of life on Earth. If you’ve found a topic you’d like to pursue, it’s time to hit the books (or online databases)! Begin reading broadly on your chosen topic so you can define a specific research question. If you’re unsure where to begin, contact a research librarian who can connect you with pertinent resources. As you familiarize yourself with the discourse surrounding your topic, consider what questions spring to mind. Those questions may represent gaps around which you can craft a research question.

Interested in conducting academic research? Check out the following resources for information on research opportunities and programs:

• Research Opportunities for High School Students
• Colleges with the Best Undergraduate Research Programs
• College Success
• High School Success

Emily Smith

Emily earned a BA in English and Communication Studies from UNC Chapel Hill and an MA in English from Wake Forest University. While at UNC and Wake Forest, she served as a tutor and graduate assistant in each school’s writing center, where she worked with undergraduate and graduate students from all academic backgrounds. She also worked as an editorial intern for the Wake Forest University Press as well as a visiting lecturer in the Department of English at WFU, and currently works as a writing center director in western North Carolina.

• 2-Year Colleges
• Application Strategies
• Best Colleges by Major
• Best Colleges by State
• Big Picture
• Career & Personality Assessment
• College Essay
• College Search/Knowledge
• Costs & Financial Aid
• Dental School Admissions
• Extracurricular Activities
• Graduate School Admissions
• High Schools
• Law School Admissions
• Medical School Admissions
• Navigating the Admissions Process
• Online Learning
• Private High School Spotlight
• Summer Program Spotlight
• Summer Programs
• Test Prep Provider Spotlight

“Innovative and invaluable…use this book as your college lifeline.”

— Lynn O'Shaughnessy

Nationally Recognized College Expert

College Planning in Your Inbox

Join our information-packed monthly newsletter.

I am a... Student Student Parent Counselor Educator Other First Name Last Name Email Address Zip Code Area of Interest Business Computer Science Engineering Fine/Performing Arts Humanities Mathematics STEM Pre-Med Psychology Social Studies/Sciences Submit

Climate change, energy, environment and sustainability topics research guide

What is climate change.

Climate change refers to long-term shifts in temperatures and weather patterns. The world is now warming faster than at any point in recorded history, which disrupts the usual balance of nature and is a threat to human beings and other forms of life on Earth. This topic guide includes sample keywords and search terms, databases to find sources, and samples of online books.

Example keywords and subtopics

Example keywords or search terms:  

• Climate change
• global warming
• greenhouse effect or greenhouse gas
• climate crisis
• environmental change
• clean energy
• alternative energy or renewable energy
• green energy or renewable energy or clean energy
• Low carbon or carbon neutral
• Carbon offsetting
• sustainability environment or sustainability
• environmental protection
• pollution or contamination
• impact or effect or influence
• cost or price or expense or money or financial
• fossil fuels or coal or oil or gas

Tip: This is a big topic with lots written so you can often focus on one or two subtopics. This will help to find more relevant sources, more quickly and be a better fit for an assignment. 

Possible subtopics ideas:  Pick one or two subtopics and then add those words to your search.

• Health impacts of climate changes (e.g. air pollution, water pollution, etc.)
• impacts on a specific city, state, region or country
• political impacts (e.g. voting, government policy, etc.)
• impact on specific population or culture (e.g. children, elderly, racial or ethic group, country, etc.)
• specific types of renewable or alternative energy (e.g. solar, wind, bio, etc.) 
• example of new technology (e.g. electric cars or electric vehicles or hybrid vehicles
• economic impacts (e.g. business, employment, industry (e.g. oil, coal, etc.)
• weather and impacts (e.g. rising sea levels, flooding, droughts or heat waves, etc.)
• media aspects (e.g. news coverage, advertising, misinformation, movies, music, etc.) 
• Tutorial: Creating an effective search strategy

• Use meaningful keywords to find the best sources
• Apply search strategies like AND and OR to connect keywords
• Tutorial: What is a library database and why should I use one?

• Identify what a library database is
• Recognize the two main types of library databases
• Know why you should use them
• Understand why searching a library database is different than searching the general internet

Databases for finding sources

Article Databases - 

Use articles to find new research, specific information and evidence to support or refute a claim. You can also look at the bibliography or works cited to find additional sources. Some articles give an overview of a specific topic -- sometimes called "review articles" or "meta-analyses" or "systematic review." Databases are like mini-search engines for finding articles (e.g. Business Source Premier database searches business journals, business magazines and business newspapers). Pick a database that searches the subject of articles you want to find. 

• Agricultural & Environmental Science Database Search journals and literature on agriculture, pollution, animals, environment, policy, natural resources, water issues and more. Searches tools like AGRICOLA, Environmental Sciences & Pollution Management (ESPM), and Digests of Environmental Impact Statements (EIS) databases.
• GreenFILE Collection of scholarly, government and general-interest titles. Multidisciplinary by nature, GreenFILE draws on the connections between the environment and agriculture, education, law, health and technology. Topics covered include global climate change, green building, pollution, sustainable agriculture, renewable energy, recycling, and more.
• Ethnic NewsWatch Ethnic NewsWatch is a current resource of full-text newspapers, magazines, and journals of the ethnic and minority press from 1990, providing researchers access to essential, often overlooked perspectives.
• Opposing Viewpoints in Context Find articles on current issues, including viewpoint articles, topic overviews, statistics, primary documents, magazine and newspaper articles.

Sample of online books

Below are a selection of online books and readings on the broad topic. We have more online books, journal articles, and sources in our Libraries Search and article databases.  

• A climate policy revolution : what the science of complexity reveals about saving our planet by Roland Kupers ISBN: 9780674246812 Publication Date: 2020 "In this book, Roland Kupers argues that the climate crisis is well suited to the bottom-up, rapid, and revolutionary change complexity science theorizes; he succinctly makes the case that complexity science promises policy solutions to address climate change."

Get help from the U Libraries - Online!

• Peer Research Consultants Make an online 30 minute appointment for one-on-one peer assistance with your research. Get help with researching your topic, finding sources, citing sources and more. Peer Research Consultants can also help you get started with faculty-sponsored research.
• Chat 24/7 online with the Libraries Ask us anything! Chat with a librarian, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week with any research or library questions.
• Meet with a librarian Schedule an online consultations for personalized research support primarily for University of Minnesota faculty, instructors, graduate and undergraduate students and staff.

Environmental Issues Research Paper Topics

Designed to serve as a comprehensive guide for students, this page provides a wide array of environmental issues research paper topics . Whether you are just starting your course or are looking for a unique topic for your final project, you will find a wealth of ideas here. The topics are divided into ten categories, each featuring ten distinct research ideas, offering a diverse range of issues to explore. Additionally, you will find expert advice on how to select a suitable topic and how to write an impactful research paper on environmental issues. The page also introduces iResearchNet’s professional writing services, which can assist students in creating high-quality, custom research papers on any environmental issue.

100 Environmental Issues Research Paper Topics

The field of environmental science is vast and interrelated to so many other academic disciplines like civil engineering, law, and even healthcare. That is why it is imperative to create a comprehensive and engaging list of environmental issues research paper topics. These topics are not only necessary for your academic career, but they also provide valuable insights into the current state of our planet and the steps we can take to mitigate the adverse effects of human activities.

Academic Writing, Editing, Proofreading, And Problem Solving Services

Get 10% off with 24start discount code.

Climate Change

• The Impact of Climate Change on Biodiversity
• Climate Change and Agriculture
• The Role of Renewable Energy in Mitigating Climate Change
• Climate Change and Public Health
• Climate Change and Migration
• Climate Change and Natural Disasters
• Climate Change and Water Resources
• Climate Change and Food Security
• Climate Change and Urbanization
• Climate Change and Marine Life

Air Pollution

• The Effects of Air Pollution on Human Health
• Air Pollution and Climate Change
• The Role of Transportation in Air Pollution
• Air Pollution and Ecosystems
• Indoor Air Pollution
• Air Pollution and Policy
• Air Pollution and Energy Production
• Air Pollution and Urban Planning
• Air Pollution and Agriculture
• Air Pollution and Waste Management

Water Pollution

• The Impact of Water Pollution on Marine Life
• Water Pollution and Human Health
• Industrial Waste and Water Pollution
• Water Pollution and Agriculture
• Water Pollution and Policy
• Water Pollution and Waste Management
• Water Pollution and Climate Change
• Water Pollution and Urbanization
• Water Pollution and Food Security
• Water Pollution and Biodiversity

Soil Erosion

• The Impact of Soil Erosion on Agriculture
• Soil Erosion and Climate Change
• Soil Erosion and Deforestation
• Soil Erosion and Urbanization
• Soil Erosion and Water Pollution
• Soil Erosion and Desertification
• Soil Erosion and Biodiversity
• Soil Erosion and Policy
• Soil Erosion and Land Management
• Soil Erosion and Food Security

Deforestation

• The Impact of Deforestation on Biodiversity
• Deforestation and Climate Change
• Deforestation and Soil Erosion
• Deforestation and Urbanization
• Deforestation and Agriculture
• Deforestation and Policy
• Deforestation and Land Management
• Deforestation and Indigenous Rights
• Deforestation and Water Cycle
• Deforestation and Carbon Cycle

Biodiversity Loss

• The Impact of Biodiversity Loss on Ecosystem Services
• Biodiversity Loss and Climate Change
• Biodiversity Loss and Agriculture
• Biodiversity Loss and Deforestation
• Biodiversity Loss and Urbanization
• Biodiversity Loss and Policy
• Biodiversity Loss and Invasive Species
• Biodiversity Loss and Extinction
• Biodiversity Loss and Conservation
• Biodiversity Loss and Genetic Diversity

Waste Management

• The Impact of Waste Management on Public Health
• Waste Management and Climate Change
• Waste Management and Policy
• Waste Management and Urbanization
• Waste Management and Water Pollution
• Waste Management and Soil Pollution
• Waste Management and Air Pollution
• Waste Management and Recycling
• Waste Management and Landfills
• Waste Management and Plastic Pollution

Energy Consumption

• The Impact of Energy Consumption on Climate Change
• Energy Consumption and Air Pollution
• Energy Consumption and Policy
• Energy Consumption and Urbanization
• Energy Consumption and Transportation
• Energy Consumption and Renewable Energy
• Energy Consumption and Fossil Fuels
• Energy Consumption and Energy Efficiency
• Energy Consumption and Economic Growth
• Energy Consumption and Lifestyle

Overpopulation

• The Impact of Overpopulation on Natural Resources
• Overpopulation and Climate Change
• Overpopulation and Urbanization
• Overpopulation and Food Security
• Overpopulation and Water Scarcity
• Overpopulation and Biodiversity Loss
• Overpopulation and Policy
• Overpopulation and Public Health
• Overpopulation and Migration
• Overpopulation and Social Inequality

Ozone Layer Depletion

• The Impact of Ozone Layer Depletion on Human Health
• Ozone Layer Depletion and Climate Change
• Ozone Layer Depletion and Marine Life
• Ozone Layer Depletion and Policy
• Ozone Layer Depletion and Air Pollution
• Ozone Layer Depletion and UV Radiation
• Ozone Layer Depletion and Agriculture
• Ozone Layer Depletion and Skin Cancer
• Ozone Layer Depletion and Eye Diseases
• Ozone Layer Depletion and Ecosystems

This comprehensive list of environmental issues research paper topics provides a wide range of areas to choose from for your research. The topics cover major environmental issues, from climate change and air pollution to biodiversity loss and overpopulation. Each of these topics can be explored from various angles, providing a rich source of ideas for your research paper. Remember, the key to a successful research paper is a well-defined topic and a clear focus.

Environmental Issues Research Guide

Welcome to the world of environmental science, a discipline that focuses on understanding and addressing the complex challenges our planet faces today. As our society becomes increasingly aware of the critical importance of environmental sustainability, the study of environmental science has gained immense significance. In this page, we delve into the realm of environmental issues research paper topics, providing students like you with a wealth of ideas, guidance, and resources to embark on impactful research journeys.

Environmental issues, ranging from climate change to biodiversity loss, deforestation, pollution, and resource depletion, pose serious threats to our planet’s well-being. The need for in-depth research, innovative solutions, and informed decision-making has never been more urgent. As students of environmental science, you have a unique opportunity to contribute to this field of study by conducting research papers that explore various aspects of environmental issues. These research papers serve as a platform for understanding the complexities of environmental problems and proposing viable solutions.

The purpose of this page is to empower you in your research endeavors by providing a comprehensive list of environmental issues research paper topics. We recognize that choosing a suitable research topic is a critical step in the research process, and it can significantly impact the outcome and relevance of your work. Moreover, we understand the challenges students face when trying to navigate the vast landscape of environmental issues and find a research topic that aligns with their interests and goals. That’s why we are here to offer expert advice and guidance to help you make informed decisions.

Whether you are a novice researcher exploring the world of environmental science or an experienced student seeking new avenues to expand your knowledge, this page is designed to cater to your needs. Our curated list of environmental issues research paper topics spans a wide range of categories, ensuring that you can find a topic that aligns with your specific interests and academic goals. Each topic has been carefully selected to reflect the current and pressing environmental challenges we face today, allowing you to delve into the intricacies and complexities of these issues.

Moreover, we understand that writing a research paper can be a daunting task, especially for students who are new to the process or grappling with time constraints. In addition to providing you with a comprehensive list of research paper topics, we also offer writing services that allow you to order a custom environmental issues research paper tailored to your unique requirements. Our team of expert degree-holding writers is well-versed in environmental science and has extensive experience in conducting research and crafting high-quality papers.

By availing our writing services, you can benefit from the expertise of our writers, who will ensure that your research paper is meticulously researched, well-written, and aligned with the highest academic standards. We value the importance of in-depth research, customized solutions, and timely delivery. Our team is available 24/7 to provide support and address any queries or concerns you may have throughout the process. With our easy order tracking system, absolute privacy, and a money-back guarantee, you can trust us to deliver a top-quality research paper that meets your expectations.

Choosing an Environmental Issues Topic

Choosing the right environmental issues research paper topic is crucial for conducting meaningful and impactful research. With such a broad and diverse field, it can be challenging to narrow down your focus and select a topic that aligns with your interests, academic goals, and the current state of environmental science. In this section, we provide expert advice and guidance to help you navigate the process of selecting environmental issues research paper topics. Here are ten valuable tips to consider:

• Identify your areas of interest : Begin by reflecting on your personal interests within the field of environmental science. Consider the environmental issues that resonate with you the most and align with your long-term career goals. Are you passionate about climate change, water pollution, biodiversity conservation, or sustainable energy? Identifying your areas of interest will guide you towards topics that you genuinely care about.
• Stay updated on current environmental challenges : Stay informed about the current environmental challenges and emerging issues. Environmental science is a dynamic field, constantly evolving as new research and discoveries emerge. Subscribe to reputable environmental journals, attend conferences, and follow reputable sources to stay up-to-date with the latest environmental issues and debates. This will help you choose topics that are relevant and address the pressing concerns of the time.
• Consider the scope and depth of research : Evaluate the scope and depth of research required for each potential topic. Some topics may require extensive data collection, fieldwork, or laboratory experiments, while others may rely more on literature review and theoretical analysis. Consider your available resources, time constraints, and access to relevant data or research materials when selecting a topic that is feasible within the given parameters.
• Explore interdisciplinary approaches : Environmental issues are often complex and interconnected, requiring interdisciplinary perspectives. Consider topics that allow you to explore the intersections of environmental science with other disciplines such as economics, sociology, policy studies, or public health. Interdisciplinary research can provide a comprehensive understanding of environmental challenges and offer innovative solutions.
• Assess the significance and impact : Evaluate the significance and potential impact of each research topic. Ask yourself: Does the topic address a critical environmental issue? Does it have the potential to contribute to the existing body of knowledge or influence environmental policy and decision-making? Choosing a topic with significant implications can enhance the relevance and importance of your research.
• Consider local and global contexts : Environmental issues can vary in their local and global contexts. Consider topics that have relevance and implications at both scales. Local environmental issues may involve studying the impact of pollution on a specific ecosystem or analyzing the effectiveness of local environmental policies. Global topics could encompass climate change, deforestation, or biodiversity loss and their implications on a global scale.
• Seek guidance from faculty and experts : Consult with your faculty members, advisors, or experts in the field of environmental science. They can provide valuable insights, suggest potential research topics, and guide you towards relevant literature and resources. Their expertise and experience can help you refine your research focus and identify unique research angles.
• Conduct a preliminary literature review : Before finalizing your topic, conduct a preliminary literature review to familiarize yourself with existing research and identify research gaps. This will enable you to identify topics that have not been extensively explored or provide new perspectives on existing issues. A thorough literature review will also help you develop a solid research question and methodology.
• Consider the ethical implications : Environmental research often raises ethical considerations. Reflect on the potential ethical implications associated with your research topic. Consider how your research may impact communities, ecosystems, or vulnerable populations. Ensure that your research design and methodology prioritize ethical standards and promote the well-being of the environment and human communities.
• Stay flexible and open to refinement : Lastly, remain flexible and open to refining your research topic throughout the research process. As you delve deeper into your research, new insights and perspectives may emerge, leading you to adjust your focus or narrow down your research question. Embrace the iterative nature of research and allow yourself the freedom to adapt and refine your topic as needed.

By considering these ten expert tips, you can choose environmental issues research paper topics that align with your interests, contribute to the field of environmental science, and make a meaningful impact. Remember, selecting the right topic is the first step towards conducting a successful and rewarding research study.

How to Write an Environmental Issues Research Paper

Writing an environmental issues research paper requires careful planning, organization, and attention to detail. It involves conducting thorough research, analyzing data, and presenting your findings in a clear and compelling manner. In this section, we provide expert advice and ten valuable tips to guide you through the process of writing an environmental issues research paper.

• Understand the research question and objectives : Begin by thoroughly understanding the research question and objectives of your paper. Clearly define the scope and purpose of your study, ensuring that it aligns with the overall theme of environmental issues. This clarity will help you stay focused and maintain a logical flow throughout your paper.
• Conduct comprehensive literature review : Before diving into your research, conduct a comprehensive literature review. Familiarize yourself with existing studies, theories, and methodologies related to your chosen environmental issue. This will provide a foundation of knowledge and help you identify research gaps or areas where your study can contribute.
• Develop a solid research methodology : Design a robust research methodology that aligns with your research question and objectives. Determine the appropriate data collection methods, such as surveys, interviews, field observations, or laboratory experiments. Consider the ethical implications of your research and ensure compliance with ethical guidelines.
• Collect and analyze data : Collect relevant data using your chosen research methods. Ensure data integrity and accuracy by using standardized data collection techniques. Analyze the data using appropriate statistical or qualitative analysis methods, depending on the nature of your research.
• Organize your paper effectively : Create a clear and logical structure for your research paper. Organize it into sections such as introduction, literature review, methodology, results, discussion, and conclusion. Use headings and subheadings to guide the reader and make the paper easy to navigate.
• Write a compelling introduction : Begin your paper with an engaging introduction that provides background information on the environmental issue and highlights the significance of your research. Clearly state your research question or hypothesis and provide an overview of your methodology and key findings.
• Present your findings objectively : Present your research findings objectively, using appropriate data visualization techniques such as tables, graphs, or charts. Clearly interpret the results and explain their implications for the environmental issue you’re studying. Support your findings with references to relevant literature.
• Engage in critical analysis and discussion : Engage in critical analysis and discussion of your findings. Compare your results with existing research, highlight similarities, differences, or inconsistencies, and discuss possible reasons for these variations. Evaluate the strengths and limitations of your study and suggest areas for future research.
• Use clear and concise language : Communicate your ideas clearly and concisely. Avoid jargon and use plain language that is accessible to a wide audience. Define technical terms if necessary and ensure that your arguments and explanations are easy to follow.
• Craft a compelling conclusion : End your research paper with a strong conclusion that summarizes your key findings, reinforces the significance of your research, and suggests avenues for further exploration. Emphasize the implications of your study for addressing the environmental issue and provide recommendations for future actions or policies.

By following these ten expert tips, you can effectively write an environmental issues research paper that is well-structured, supported by solid evidence, and contributes to the field of environmental science. Remember to revise and proofread your paper for clarity, coherence, and grammar before submitting it for review.

Custom Research Paper Writing Services

When it comes to writing a research paper on environmental issues, we understand that students may face challenges in terms of time, resources, and expertise. That’s why iResearchNet offers professional writing services to assist students in their academic journey. Our team of expert writers, experienced in environmental science and research, is ready to provide customized solutions to meet your specific needs. Here are 13 key features of our writing services:

• Expert Degree-Holding Writers : Our writing team consists of expert degree-holding writers with extensive knowledge and experience in the field of environmental science. They possess the expertise to tackle complex environmental issues and deliver high-quality research papers.
• Custom Written Works : We understand that every research paper is unique. Our writers will tailor your paper to your specific requirements, ensuring that it is customized and meets your academic standards.
• In-Depth Research : Our writers conduct thorough research to gather relevant and up-to-date information on the chosen environmental issue. They delve deep into scholarly resources, scientific journals, and credible databases to provide you with well-researched content.
• Custom Formatting : We adhere to various formatting styles, including APA, MLA, Chicago/Turabian, and Harvard. Our writers are well-versed in these formatting guidelines and will ensure that your research paper is formatted correctly.
• Top Quality : We prioritize delivering top-quality research papers that meet the highest academic standards. Our writers are committed to excellence and will strive to exceed your expectations.
• Customized Solutions : We understand that each research paper has unique requirements. Our writers will work closely with you to understand your specific needs and provide customized solutions that address your research objectives.
• Flexible Pricing : We offer flexible pricing options to accommodate students’ budgets. Our pricing structure is transparent, and we provide competitive rates for our high-quality writing services.
• Short Deadlines : We recognize that students often face tight deadlines. Our writers are equipped to handle urgent orders, offering short turnaround times of up to 3 hours while maintaining the quality of the research paper.
• Timely Delivery : We value punctuality and understand the importance of submitting your research paper on time. Our writers work diligently to ensure timely delivery, allowing you to meet your academic deadlines without stress.
• 24/7 Support : Our customer support team is available 24/7 to address your queries, provide updates on your order, and assist you throughout the writing process. We prioritize effective communication and timely responses to ensure a smooth and satisfactory experience.
• Absolute Privacy : We prioritize the privacy and confidentiality of our clients. Rest assured that all personal and order-related information will be handled securely and kept confidential.
• Easy Order Tracking : Our user-friendly platform allows you to easily track the progress of your order. You can stay informed about the status of your research paper, communicate with your assigned writer, and provide additional instructions if needed.
• Money Back Guarantee : We are committed to customer satisfaction. If, for any reason, you are not fully satisfied with the delivered research paper, we offer a money back guarantee, ensuring your investment is protected.

By availing our writing services, you can have peace of mind knowing that your environmental issues research paper is in capable hands. Our team of dedicated writers will deliver a customized and high-quality paper that meets your academic requirements and helps you excel in your studies.

Empower Your Academic Journey!

At iResearchNet, we are committed to supporting your academic success in environmental science. Now is the time to take action and make a difference by ordering a custom environmental issues research paper from our dedicated team of experts. By choosing our services, you can focus on making a positive impact on the environment while we take care of your research paper needs.

By entrusting your environmental issues research paper to our team, you gain access to a wealth of expertise and resources that will elevate your academic work. Our experienced writers will craft a meticulously researched and well-written paper that addresses your chosen environmental issue with depth and clarity. You can expect a comprehensive analysis of the topic, thoughtful insights, and a unique perspective that sets your research paper apart.

Take advantage of our user-friendly platform and seamless ordering process. With just a few clicks, you can submit your requirements, communicate with your assigned writer, and track the progress of your research paper. Our dedicated customer support team is available 24/7 to assist you at every step of the way. We prioritize open communication, timely responses, and a smooth customer experience.

ORDER HIGH QUALITY CUSTOM PAPER

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

• View all journals
• Explore content
• About the journal
• Publish with us
• Sign up for alerts

Collection  12 March 2021

2020 Top 50 Earth, Environmental, and Planetary Sciences Articles

We are pleased to share with you the 50 most downloaded Nature Communications articles* across Earth, environmental, and planetary sciences published in 2020. Featuring authors from around the world, these papers highlight valuable research from an international community. 

Browse all Top 50 subject area collections here .

* Data obtained from SN Insights (based on Digital Science's Dimensions) and has been normalised to account for articles published later in the year.

Anthropogenic modification of forests means only 40% of remaining forests have high ecosystem integrity

Mapping and quantifying degree of forest modification is critical to conserve and manage forests. Here the authors propose a new quantitative metric for landscape integrity and apply it to a global forest map, showing that less than half of the world’s forest cover has high integrity, most of which is outside nationally designed protected areas.

• H. S. Grantham
• J. E. M. Watson

Hysteresis of tropical forests in the 21st century

Tropical rainforests partly create their own climatic conditions by promoting precipitation, therefore rainforest losses may trigger dramatic shifts. Here the authors combine remote sensing, hydrological modelling, and atmospheric moisture tracking simulations to assess forest-rainfall feedbacks in three major tropical rainforest regions on Earth and simulate potential changes under a severe climate change scenario.

• Ingo Fetzer
• Obbe A. Tuinenburg

Understanding and managing new risks on the Nile with the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam

Several dams and reservoirs exist along the Nile, most notably the HAD (Egypt) and GERD (Ethiopia) dams. Due to the lack of strategies, the authors here explore potential risks and solutions how to use both dams simultaneously.

• Kevin G. Wheeler
• Marc Jeuland
• Dale Whittington

Renewable energy production will exacerbate mining threats to biodiversity

Renewable energy production is necessary to mitigate climate change, however, generating the required technologies and infrastructure will demand huge production increases of many metals. Here, the authors map mining areas and assess spatial coincidence with biodiversity conservation sites, and show that new mining threats to biodiversity may surpass those averted by climate change mitigation.

• Laura J. Sonter
• Marie C. Dade
• Rick K. Valenta

A steeply-inclined trajectory for the Chicxulub impact

The authors here present a 3D model that simulates the formation of the Chicxulub impact crater. Based on asymmetries in the subsurface structure of the Chicxulub crater, the authors diagnose impact angle and direction and suggest a steeply inclined (60° to horizontal) impact from the northeast.

• G. S. Collins
• Third-Party Scientists

Centennial response of Greenland’s three largest outlet glaciers

The Greenland Ice Sheet is the largest land ice contributor to sea level rise and understanding the long-term glacier response to external forcing is key to improved projections. Here the authors show Greenland’s three largest outlet glaciers will likely exceed current worst-case scenario

• Shfaqat A. Khan
• Anders A. Bjørk
• Toni Schenk

The economic costs of planting, preserving, and managing the world’s forests to mitigate climate change

Forests are critical for stabilizing our climate, but costs of mitigation remain uncertain. Here the authors show the global forest sector could reduce emissions by 6.0 GtCO 2  yr −1 in 2055, or roughly 10% of the mitigation needed to limit warming to 1.5 °C by mid-century, at a cost of 393 billion USD yr −1 , or $281/tCO 2 .

• K. G. Austin
• J. S. Baker

Greater Greenland Ice Sheet contribution to global sea level rise in CMIP6

The potential contribution of Greenland Ice Sheet to sea level rise in the future is known to be substantial. Here, the authors undertake new modelling showing that the Greenland Ice Sheet sea level rise contribution is 7.9 cm more using the CMIP6 SSP585 scenario compared to CMIP5 using multiple RCP8.5 simulations.

• Stefan Hofer
• Charlotte Lang
• Xavier Fettweis

Likely weakening of the Florida Current during the past century revealed by sea-level observations

Understanding trends in ocean circulation and dynamics is hampered by a lack of long-term records. Here the author uses probabilistic reanalysis of available data to show that transport by the Florida Current has declined over the past 110 years, indicating a slowdown of Atlantic Ocean circulation.

• Christopher G. Piecuch

Space station biomining experiment demonstrates rare earth element extraction in microgravity and Mars gravity

Rare earth elements are used in electronics, but increase in demand could lead to low supply. Here the authors conduct experiments on the International Space Station and show microbes can extract rare elements from rocks at low gravity, a finding that could extend mining potential to other planets.

• Charles S. Cockell
• Rosa Santomartino
• René Demets

Towards a global-scale soil climate mitigation strategy

Reducing soil degradation and improving soil management could make an important contribute to climate change mitigation. Here the authors discuss opportunities and challenges towards implementing a global climate mitigation strategy focused on carbon sequestration in agricultural soils, and propose a framework for guiding region- and soil-specific management options.

A spatial emergent constraint on the sensitivity of soil carbon turnover to global warming

The fate of the carbon locked away in soil is uncertain, and there are vast differences between models. Here the authors apply observational, spatio-temporal constraints on carbon turnover projections and find that uncertainty in estimations of carbon dynamics are reduced by 50%.

• Rebecca M. Varney
• Sarah E. Chadburn
• Peter M. Cox

High concentrations of plastic hidden beneath the surface of the Atlantic Ocean

The risks posed by plastic contamination of the ocean cannot be assessed as their amount and location remain largely unknown. Here the authors show that large quantities of microplastics exist below the ocean surface over the entire Atlantic in quantities greater than previously estimated.

• Katsiaryna Pabortsava
• Richard S. Lampitt

Iron mineral dissolution releases iron and associated organic carbon during permafrost thaw

Iron minerals trap carbon in permafrost, preventing microbial degradation and release to the atmosphere as CO 2 , but the stability of this carbon as permafrost thaws is unclear. Here the authors use nanoscale analyses to show that thaw conditions stimulate Fe-reducing bacteria that trigger carbon release.

• Monique S. Patzner
• Carsten W. Mueller
• Casey Bryce

Global hotspots for the occurrence of compound events

Compound climate events such as floods and droughts together can cause severe socio-economic impacts. Here, the authors analyse global hazard pairs from 1980–2014 and find global hotspots for the occurrence of compound events.

• Nina N. Ridder
• Andy J. Pitman
• Jakob Zscheischler

Few keystone plant genera support the majority of Lepidoptera species

Not all plants are equally able to support native insects. Here, the authors use data on interactions among >12,000 Lepidoptera species and >2000 plant genera across the United States, showing that few plant genera host the majority of Lepidoptera species; this information is used to suggest priorities for plant restoration.

• Desiree L. Narango
• Douglas W. Tallamy
• Kimberley J. Shropshire

Remote sensing reveals Antarctic green snow algae as important terrestrial carbon sink

Snow algae bloom along the coast of Antarctica and are likely to be biogeochemically important. Here, the authors produced the first map of such blooms, show that they are driven by warmer temperatures and proximity to birds and mammals, and are likely to increase given projected climate changes.

• Andrew Gray
• Monika Krolikowski
• Matthew P. Davey

Farming fish in the sea will not nourish the world

Marine aquaculture is widely proposed as compatible with ocean sustainability, biodiversity conservation, and human nutrition goals. In this Perspective, Belton and colleagues dispute the empirical validity of such claims and contend that the potential of marine aquaculture has been much exaggerated.

• David C. Little
• Shakuntala H. Thilsted

Migrant birds and mammals live faster than residents

Migration is costly. In the first global analysis of migratory vertebrates, authors report that migratory birds and mammals have faster paces of life than their non-migratory relatives, and that among swimming and walking species, migrants tend to be larger, while among flying species, migrants are smaller.

• Andrea Soriano-Redondo
• Jorge S. Gutiérrez
• Stuart Bearhop

Global warming due to loss of large ice masses and Arctic summer sea ice

The disintegration of cryosphere elements such as the Arctic summer sea ice, mountain glaciers, Greenland and West Antarctica is associated with temperature and radiative feedbacks. In this work, the authors quantify these feedbacks and find an additional global warming of 0.43°C.

• Nico Wunderling
• Matteo Willeit
• Ricarda Winkelmann

Asteroid shower on the Earth-Moon system immediately before the Cryogenian period revealed by KAGUYA

Ancient impact events on Earth are not well characterized due to continuous re-surfacing of Earth. Here, the authors study impact craters on the Moon with ages up to 800 million years ago and present a cross correlation to Earth, linking up to mass extinction events throughout Earth’s history.

• Kentaro Terada
• Tomokatsu Morota

The cascading origin of the 2018 Kīlauea eruption and implications for future forecasting

• M. R. Patrick
• B. F. Houghton

The erosion of biodiversity and biomass in the Atlantic Forest biodiversity hotspot

Quantifying forest degradation and biodiversity losses is necessary to inform conservation and restoration policies. Here the authors analyze a large dataset for the Atlantic Forest in South America to quantify losses in forest biomass and tree species richness, functional traits, and conservation value.

• Renato A. F. de Lima
• Alexandre A. Oliveira
• Paulo I. Prado

Thousands of reptile species threatened by under-regulated global trade

There are gaps in international efforts to monitor the wildlife trade, with many species potentially being undetected by the established monitoring groups. Here the authors use an automated web search to document the sale of reptiles online, revealing over 36% of all known reptile species are in trade, including many missing from official databases.

• Benjamin M. Marshall
• Colin Strine
• Alice C. Hughes

Organo–organic and organo–mineral interfaces in soil at the nanometer scale

Historically it has been maintained that soil organic carbon (SOC) is stabilized through interactions with mineral interfaces. Here the authors use cryo-electron microscopy and spectroscopy to show that SOC interactions can also occur between organic forms in patchy, disordered structure.

• Angela R. Possinger
• Michael J. Zachman
• Johannes Lehmann

Atmospheric transport is a major pathway of microplastics to remote regions

Plastic pollution is a critical concern across diverse ecosystems, yet most research has focused on terrestrial and aquatic transport, neglecting other mechanisms. Here the authors show that atmospheric transport is a major pathway for road plastic pollution over remote regions.

• N. Evangeliou

Determining the current size and state of subvolcanic magma reservoirs

This study makes use of the total spread of zircon ages and trace elements to study the thermal evolution of magmatic systems. Applied to Nevado de Toluca, the authors determine the size of its subvolcanic magma reservoir and assess its potential of re-activation.

• Gregor Weber
• Luca Caricchi
• Axel K. Schmitt

Revised estimates of ocean-atmosphere CO 2 flux are consistent with ocean carbon inventory

Ocean uptake of carbon dioxide impacts the climate, but flux estimates from surface measurements have not been corrected for temperature differences between surface and water sampling depth. Making that correction, the authors find previous estimates for ocean uptake have been substantially underestimated.

• Andrew J. Watson
• Ute Schuster
• Lonneke Goddijn-Murphy

Large deep-sea zooplankton biomass mirrors primary production in the global ocean

Zooplankton biomass in the dark ocean is thought to be low and weakly coupled to epipelagic primary production, but recent evidence suggests otherwise. Here the authors analyse data from the Malaspina Circumnavigation Expedition and published data to estimate bathypelagic zooplankton biomass and assess its relationship to primary production, currently not well accounted for in oceanic C budget.

• S. Hernández-León
• R. Koppelmann
• C. M. Duarte

Just ten percent of the global terrestrial protected area network is structurally connected via intact land

The effectiveness of protected areas depends not only on whether they are intact, but also on whether they are mutually connected. Here the authors examine the structural connectivity of terrestrial protected areas globally, finding that less than 10% of the protected network can be considered connected.

• Michelle Ward
• Santiago Saura
• James E. M. Watson

Precise radiometric age establishes Yarrabubba, Western Australia, as Earth’s oldest recognised meteorite impact structure

The ~70 km-diameter Yarrabubba impact structure in Western Australia has previously been regarded as among Earth’s oldest meteorite craters, but has hitherto lacked absolute age constraints. Here, the authors determine a precise impact age of 2229 ± 5 Ma, which extends the terrestrial cratering record back in time by > 200 million years and establishes Yarrabubba as the oldest recognised meteorite impact structure on Earth.

• Timmons M. Erickson
• Christopher L. Kirkland
• Thomas M. Davison

Global phosphorus shortage will be aggravated by soil erosion

Phosphorus is an essential nutrient critical for agriculture, but because it is non-renewable its future availability is threatened. Here the authors show that across the globe most nations have net losses of phosphorus, with soil erosion as the major route of loss in Europe, Africa and South America.

• Christine Alewell
• Bruno Ringeval
• Pasquale Borrelli

Impacts of irrigated agriculture on food–energy–water–CO 2 nexus across metacoupled systems

Local human activities can lead to cross-border environmental impacts through the food–energy–water–CO 2 nexus. Here, the authors report wide variations in environmental impacts of irrigated agriculture across counties within the North China Plain under different environmental and socioeconomic scenarios.

• Xiuzhi Chen

The genomic timeline of cichlid fish diversification across continents

Cichlids are a model for adaptive radiation, but the timing of their diversification is debated. Here the authors assemble 14 cichlid genomes, introduce a Bayesian approach to account for fossil-assignment uncertainty, and present a dated phylogenomic hypothesis of cichlid and teleost evolution.

• Michael Matschiner
• Astrid Böhne
• Walter Salzburger

Pervasive subduction zone devolatilization recycles CO 2 into the forearc

The fate of subducted CO 2 remains debated, with estimates mainly from numerical predictions varying from wholesale decarbonation of the shallow subducting slab to massive deep subduction of CO 2 . Here, the authors present field-based data and show that ~40% to ~65% of the CO 2 in subducting crust is released via metamorphic decarbonation reactions at forearc depths.

• E. M. Stewart
• Jay J. Ague

Extinction of eastern Sahul megafauna coincides with sustained environmental deterioration

The causes of the Upper Pleistocene megafauna extinction in Australia and New Guinea are debated, but fossil data are lacking for much of this region. Here, Hocknull and colleagues report a new, diverse megafauna assemblage from north-eastern Australia that persisted until ~40,000 years ago.

• Scott A. Hocknull
• Richard Lewis
• Rochelle A. Lawrence

Strong hydroclimatic controls on vulnerability to subsurface nitrate contamination across Europe

Excess fertilizer use causes subsurface contamination. Here, the authors conduct an assessment of water quality vulnerability across Europe, finding that 75% of agricultural regions are susceptible to nitrate contamination for least one-third of the year, two times more than using standard estimation procedure.

• S. Attinger

Earthquake transformer—an attentive deep-learning model for simultaneous earthquake detection and phase picking

The authors here present a deep learning model that simultaneously detects earthquake signals and measures seismic-phase arrival times. The model performs particularly well for cases with high background noise and the challenging task of picking the S wave arrival.

• S. Mostafa Mousavi
• William L. Ellsworth
• Gregory C. Beroza

Glacial heterogeneity in Southern Ocean carbon storage abated by fast South Indian deglacial carbon release

A Southern Ocean influences on the carbon cycle is considered a key component of deglacial changes. Here, the authors show spatial differences in glacial Southern Ocean carbon storage that dissipated rapidly 14.6 kyr ago, revealing a South Indian Ocean contribution to rapid deglacial atmospheric CO 2 increases.

• Julia Gottschalk
• Elisabeth Michel
• Samuel L. Jaccard

Delayed emergence of a global temperature response after emission mitigation

Strong mitigation of anthropogenic emissions is necessary, but it is not clear how fast these efforts would lead to temperature changes. Here, the authors find that there is a substantial delay between reductions of emissions and a detectable change in surface temperature for a number of climate forcers.

• B. H. Samset
• J. S. Fuglestvedt

The human impact on North American erosion, sediment transfer, and storage in a geologic context

Human activities have accelerated soil erosion and landscape change in many areas. Here the authors show how rates of erosion, sediment transfer and alluvial sedimentation have increased by an order of magnitude across North America since European colonization, far exceeding the rates expected of natural processes.

• David B. Kemp
• Peter M. Sadler
• Veerle Vanacker

Breaking Earth’s shell into a global plate network

How Earth’s lithosphere first divided into tectonic plates remains uncertain. Here, the authors use 3D spherical shell models to demonstrate that anticipated warming of the early lithosphere should lead to thermal expansion and the initiation of a global network of rifts, dividing the lithosphere into tectonic plates.

• A. A. G. Webb

The influence of soil age on ecosystem structure and function across biomes

Soil age is thought to be an important driver of ecosystem development. Here, the authors perform a global survey of soil chronosequences and meta-analysis to show that, contrary to expectations, soil age is a relatively minor ecosystem driver at the biome scale once other drivers such as parent material, climate, and vegetation type are accounted for.

• Manuel Delgado-Baquerizo
• Peter B. Reich
• Noah Fierer

Episodes of fast crystal growth in pegmatites

Pegmatite crystals are thought to grow rapidly, yet their growth rates and conditions are not well constrained. Here, the authors find that the trace element distributions of pegmatitic quartz crystals indicate rapid growth in highly dynamic environments, suggesting that large meter-scale crystals can be formed within days.

• Patrick R. Phelps
• Cin-Ty A. Lee
• Douglas M. Morton

Regime shifts occur disproportionately faster in larger ecosystems

Little is known about how the speed of ecosystem collapse depends on ecosystem size. Here, Cooper, Willcock et al. analyse empirical data and models finding that although regime shift duration increases with ecosystem size, this relationship saturates and even large ecosystems can collapse in a few decades.

• Gregory S. Cooper
• Simon Willcock
• John A. Dearing

Over 90 endangered fish and invertebrates are caught in industrial fisheries

Due to legislative shortfalls, species of global conservation concern can still be captured in commercial fisheries. Here the authors show that 91 threatened species are reported in catch/landing databases, 13 of which are traded internationally despite their conservation concern.

• Leslie A. Roberson
• Reg A. Watson
• Carissa J. Klein

Cropland expansion in the United States produces marginal yields at high costs to wildlife

Conversion of natural ecosystems to cropland is a threat to most native wildlife. Here the authors quantify the impact of recent cropland expansion on the habitat of representative pollinator, bird, plant species across the conterminous United States, showing diminished crop yield returns at the cost of important habitat losses.

• Tyler J. Lark
• Seth A. Spawn
• Holly K. Gibbs

Using publicly available satellite imagery and deep learning to understand economic well-being in Africa

It is generally difficult to scale derived estimates and understand the accuracy across locations for passively-collected data sources, such as mobile phones and satellite imagery. Here the authors show that their trained deep learning models are able to explain 70% of the variation in ground-measured village wealth in held-out countries, outperforming previous benchmarks from high-resolution imagery with errors comparable to that of existing ground data.

• Christopher Yeh
• Anthony Perez
• Marshall Burke

Soil moisture dominates dryness stress on ecosystem production globally

Dryness stresses vegetation and can lead to declines in productivity, increased emission of carbon, and plant mortality, but the drivers of this stress remain unclear. Here the authors show that soil moisture plays a dominant role relative to atmospheric water demand over most global land vegetated areas.

• Lukas Gudmundsson
• Sonia I. Seneviratne

Climate change will affect global water availability through compounding changes in seasonal precipitation and evaporation

Adequate water availability is key to human and ecosystem sustainability. Here, the authors show that seasonally variable regimes become more variable, and the combined influence of seasonality and magnitude of climate variables will affect future water availability.

• Goutam Konapala
• Ashok K. Mishra
• Michael E. Mann

Pollution exacerbates China’s water scarcity and its regional inequality

The impact on inadequate water quality on water scarcity is unclear. Here the authors quantify China’s present-day water scarcity and show that inadequate water quality exacerbates China’s water scarcity, which is unevenly distributed across the country.

• Chenghu Zhou

Mapping global urban land for the 21st century with data-driven simulations and Shared Socioeconomic Pathways

Here the authors develop a set of global, long-term, spatial projections of urban land expansion for understanding the planet’s potential urban futures. The global total amount of urban land increases by a factor of 1.8-5.9 over the 21st century, and the developed world experiences as much new urban development as the developing world.

• Brian C. O’Neill

Quick links

• Explore articles by subject
• Guide to authors
• Editorial policies

Top 100 Environmental Science Project Topics

Table of contents

• 1 Climate Change
• 2 Renewable Energy
• 3 Urban Ecology
• 4 Land and Water Use
• 5 Pollution
• 6 Environmental Science Topics for College Students
• 7 Energy Resources and Consumption
• 8 Population
• 9 Noise and Light Pollution
• 10.1 Conclusion

With the environment and global warming in its current predicament, it’s no surprise that environmental science job opportunities will be on the rise in the very near future.

With the environment and global warming in its current predicament, it’s no surprise that environmental science job opportunities will be on the rise in the very near future. Therefore, so are the numbers of students pursuing studies in this field. The last four decades have seen huge changes in the rate of global warming and so more than ever before, we need people to study topics in environmental science.

For anyone majoring in environmental science, anyone needing to write  environmental studies project topics for a science course, or essay writer who is working on topical essays this comprehensive article will talk you through the top ten project topics to pursue. For each project topic, we’ll give you ten ideas.

Climate Change

There’ll always be an environment, but it’s looking more and more likely that it won’t be like our current one in the future. With this in mind, here are the top ten environmental project topics for college students on climate change:

• Is global warming a natural phenomenon?
• The politicization of global warming.
• How do eddy covariance towers work?
• Planetary tilt – does it affect global warming?
• The differences between climate change and the greenhouse effect.
• Why is carbon dioxide a greenhouse gas?
• How do changes to weather patterns affect the Earth’s climate?
• The concept of polar amplification.
• The barriers to climate change responses.
• The “heat island” effect.

Renewable Energy

Our advances through the industrial revolution and the use of fossil fuels are now coming back to bite us. Here are ten environmental topics for project on renewable energy:

• The pros and cons of hydropower.
• Solar energy and pollution.
• Solar energy to help the economy.
• Geothermal energy: an unlikely major energy source?
• The problems caused by renewable energies.
• Understanding geothermal energy.
• Are hydrogen fuel cells a viable alternative?
• The advantages and disadvantages of solar power.
• Transporting geothermal energy: a study.
• The challenges of large-scale biomass energy use.

Urban Ecology

Urban ecology is an important consideration for environmental science projects for college students who are eager to pay for essay to receive high grades for assignments. When we study the environment, we tend to think of green spaces and rural lands, but urban ecology is important too. As such, here are ten environmental science project ideas on this topic:

• How do unequal urban planning and greenspace distribution affect temperatures in a city?
• How does urbanization affect surrounding rural areas?
• How is the local climate affected by buildings and pavements?
• What is the urban heat island effect?
• How are water sources affected by urbanization?
• How has human development affected our green spaces?
• How is social identity linked to urbanization?
• What impact does transport have on rural locations?
• How can the natural environment be integrated into urban planning and design projects?
• What is water harvesting?

Land and Water Use

When humans use natural resources, they also disrupt natural ecosystems. This is an important area of study as we try to claw back and save some of the world’s resources from being entirely depleted. Here are ten interesting  environment related topics for project on this subject:

• How have overfishing and non-sustainable fishing methods affected our oceans?
• How does using water for irrigation affect natural ecosystems?
• The impacts of different societies’ ecological footprints in terms of waste production and resource demands.
• How can we mitigate deforestation?
• An analysis of The Green Revolution.
• The impact of salt application to streams.
• How does using an ANN (artificial neural network) for rainfall-runoff affect ecosystems?
• How do land-use changes impact urban runoff?
• Relationships between water quality, land use and land use change.
• Land use effects on lake water quality.

Pollution is one of the planet and humanity’s worst enemies. Agriculture, transportation, and industry can cause horrific environmental catastrophes. Check out the possible environment science project topics on pollution:

• The impact of pollution on health care.
• The effects of environmental pollution and water pollution on marine life.
• The effects of air pollution on the food chain.
• How environmental pollution affects Arctic.
• The health hazards associated with waste accumulation and water pollution.
• How do human activities change the world’s oceans?
• Conservation and how it helps to reduce air pollution.
• The difficulty of establishing direct links between health problems, air pollution, and air quality.
• Environmental policy regarding air pollution and acid rain.
• The effect of acid rain in urban and natural areas.

Environmental Science Topics for College Students

Environmental studies at college is all about studying in-depth biological, chemical, and physical processes on Earth. Environmental sciences also incorporates social, cultural, and political processes that have an impact. When studying Environmental Science at college level, a project need to seek out ways to present complex relationships in a simple way. Here are some ideal environmental science projects for college students:

• Genetically Modified (GM) foods and their impact on the environment.
• The global impact of radiation and nuclear accidents.
• The role of the UNEP in environmental conservation.
• The impact of freak weather incidents.
• Micro-plastics in drinking water – why and how have they got there?
• The Nagasaki and Hiroshima bombings – what have we learned about nuclear bombs and the effects on the ecosystem?
• The impact of Coronavirus and maintaining the ecosystem.
• The role of the media in conservation campaigns.
• Tourism and the impact of human activities on a local and global level.
• How has the US departure from the Paris Climate Agreement changed things?

Energy Resources and Consumption

Lots of  environmental studies project topics goes into looking at energy resources and consumption, which makes this a great project topic. There is already a lot of information out there, which makes this easy to research.

• What is the relationship between energy efficiency and energy conservation?
• What are the economic, social, and environmental costs of solar energy?
• Was coal pivotal in industrialization?
• The impact of fracking on the environment.
• Compare and contrast the processes of extracting oil and mining coal.
• How is ethanol produced as a biofuel?
• Nuclear energy is a viable clean energy. Discuss.
• The environmental effects of a nuclear conflict explored.
• What is plant biomass?
• The challenges of converting to large-scale biomass energy.

You can't write a list environment project topics  about environmental science, without mentioning population, environmental health, and the changes we've seen over the years. A lot of environment research focuses on population and its effects. Here are some ideas:

• Population growth and its effects on GDP.
• Factors that control population growth and the effect of density.
• An exploration of population momentum.
• The importance of studying population ecology.
• The effect of human migration on populations.
• The effects of overpopulation.
• The effects of global warming on the global population.
• Is sustainable development possible in a growing population?
• What would happen if the demand for natural resources became greater than the supply?
• How serious is the world population explosion?

Noise and Light Pollution

Though lots of people don’t consider light and noise as pollutants, the reality is that they are. Noise levels and light levels can affect organisms. Here are some interesting topics for science projects on noise and light pollution:

• How is local wildlife affected by airport noise?
• What happens if orcas aren’t able to use echolocation due to freight noise?
• Migrating birds and the confusion from bright lights.
• The effect of bright lights in resorts and sea turtles emerging from nests.
• How bright city lights affect nocturnal animals.
• The disruption of nocturnal activity in frogs and toads due to artificial light glare.
• Artificial lights and the effects on migratory birds.
• Light pollution and the effects on plants.
• Changes in animal behavior due to noise pollution.
• Noise pollution and the effects on mating frogs.

Conservation Biology

With as many as 2,000 species becoming extinct each year, we’re experiencing a serious problem. Conservation biology is a huge topic of interest when you need to " write my essay " and want to succeed with this task. Here are some ideas for exploration:

• How has human behavior ramped up endangered species extinction rates?
• How do humans threaten endangered species?
• What will the effects of a loss in biodiversity be for humans?
• If honeybees become extinct, what other changes would we see?
• Why is the decline in pollinating insects so dangerous?
• What happens if we lose endangered species?
• What is the Holocene extinction event?
• The collapse of the world’s coral reef ecosystems.
• The threat of acidification in our oceans.
• How can environmental policy help threats to biodiversity?

It's clear to say that there is a huge variety in topics in environmental science. For anyone looking for an environmental science project topic, we hope this extensive list has helped narrow down your ideas. Whether you're looking for environmental research topics for college students or high school, there is something for everyone here.

Readers also enjoyed

WHY WAIT? PLACE AN ORDER RIGHT NOW!

Just fill out the form, press the button, and have no worries!

We use cookies to give you the best experience possible. By continuing we’ll assume you board with our cookie policy.

485 Environment Essay Topics

🏆 best essay topics on environment, ✍️ environment essay topics for college, 👍 good environment research topics & essay examples, 🌶️ hot environment ideas to write about, 🎓 most interesting environment research titles, 💡 simple environment essay ideas, 📌 easy environment essay topics, ❓ environment research questions.

• The Amazon Rainforest: Essay Example
• The Relationship Between the Environment and Humans
• Going Green Essay Example
• Lebanon’s Environmental Problems and Solutions
• Florence Nightingale’s Environmental Theory and Its Application
• The Relationship Between the Environment and Development
• The Environmental Impact of Electric Vehicles
• Environmental Issues in Educational Institutions Teaching and learning environments need to have various characteristics, which ensure that students and teachers are comfortable, safe and promote the acquisition of information.
• Environmental Studies: Nature and Its Importance This essay will discuss nature and its importance to human beings. Man is interconnected with the environment and cannot exist in isolation.
• Problems That City Causes for People and Environment When an environment is affected, men are also directly affected because they entirely depend on environment for survival.
• Environmental Health Theory and Climate Change In the environmental health theory, there is a view on how environmental health, human ecology, and health affect the public.
• Deforestation and Its Effects on the Environment The whole aspect of deforestation has had numerous and devastating effects on the environment and the economy as a whole.
• The Role of Nurses in Environmental Health This paper explores the factors that affect health and the roles of nurses in improving or eliminating environmental barriers to health.
• Social Change and Its Impact on Environment Human activities are the leading causes of environmental problems; these activities are good topics for sociological study.
• Florence Nightingale’s Environmental Theory Role in Nursing Nursing theories provide very important principles to nursing practice. This paper presents a discussion of the environmental theory developed by Florence Nightingale.
• Florence Nightingale Environmental Theory Analysis This paper analyzes the environmental theory of nursing as one of the most significant theories that have brought vital changes in nursing.
• The Environmental Impact of Air Travel The project discusses the work of aircraft engines, that produce heat, pollutants, emissions, and gases that affect the atmosphere and contribute to the emergence of negative changes in the climate.
• The Ubiquity of Microorganisms in the Environment Microbes are ubiquitous, they live everywhere and can be found in different environments, like water, air, and animals.
• Volunteering in an Environmental Group Volunteering in environmental groups is becoming increasingly popular among those concerned about the state of the environment.
• Nurses’ Role in Environmental Health Nurses should support policies of eliminating barriers to environmental health, and assist, educate, monitor the environmental health of individuals and communities.
• Deforestation and Its Effects on Our Environment Deforestation involves the permanent removal of trees for several reasons and significantly affects the environment. It entails destroying, clearing, or removing trees.
• Environmental Issues in The Lorax Movie The movie The Lorax narrates the story of a walled city that is characterized by an artificial way of life. This essay gives a detailed summary and discussion of the film.
• Natural Resource Degradation and Factors Affecting the Environment The trees, rivers, oceans, and land surrounding us, are all essential parts of our lives, without which survival would be hindered.
• Critique of Florence Nightingale’s Environmental Theory According to Nightingale’s environmental theory, environment is an important aspect of the nursing care offered to patients.
• Apple Inc.’s Environmental Sustainability By using Apple company as an example, this research paper discusses various strategies companies use to ensure a safe, clean, and sustainable environment.
• Deforestation Environmental Effects and Solution Deforestation is one of the most urgent environmental problems in the 21st-century world, as it triggers numerous harmful and irreversible environmental effects.
• Environmental Sustainability and Its Importance for the Future This paper discusses the concept of environmental sustainability and its significance for the well-being of both the environment and humanity.
• Concept of Healthy Environment The history of the concept of the healthy environment on both the domestic and global fronts is largely fashioned or woven around the development and socialization process of mankind.
• Environmental Impact of the Chemical Industry This paper discusses a range of issues potentially caused by the chemical industry and includes implications for human health and future well-being.
• Environmental Health and Health Effects of Environment Environmental change has both beneficial and severe effects on human well-being. Some effects of environmental change are easy to detect, while others are hard to identify.
• Environmental Issues and Human Health The purpose of this paper is to discuss the impact of environmental threats on human health and the strategies developed to address them.
• Recycling in Dubai and Its Impact on the Population and Environment The proposal provides an insight into how recycling can be conducted and respective benefits of the same on the environment.
• Environmental Degradation and Its Impact on Women Women claimed to be particularly impacted by environmental degradation due to their traditional role of performing agricultural activities.
• Nightingale’s Environment Theory Analysis and Relevance Florence Nightingale is the founder of contemporary nursing. Her environmental theory has four major concepts: the environment, the person, health, and nursing practice.
• Forest Fires as a Global Environmental Hazard Every year, uncontrolled fire kills a large number of people and animals and also has a long-term effect on the environment.
• Electric Vehicles and Their Environmental Impact This essay argues that electric automobiles can become a sustainable alternative to combustion engines, but only as a part of a broader paradigm shift.
• The United Arab Emirates: Environmental Issues The research on the environmental issues and the responsibilities of the companies in UAE in the matter has given a proper idea of hope within the nation.
• Deforestation: Causes, Environmental Effects, Solutions This paper aims to study the environmental effects of deforestation and suggest potential solutions for this issue.
• Global Warming Effects on the Environment and Animals Global warming is a threat to the survival and well-being of human and animal life. This discussion aims to provide the effects of the current global warming threats.
• Peru – Globalization, Environment, Crime and Disease The paper synthesizes a number of legitimate sources to focus on globalization and its effects on Peru with special relation to environmental issues, crime, and diseases.
• Using Nightingale’s Environmental Theory A recovery plan for a chronically ill patient entails numerous interventions, including the patient’s environment or setting.
• Noise in Nightingale’s Environmental Theory The purpose of this paper is to analyze the concept of noise and audial disturbances through the prism of Nightingale’s environmental theory.
• Environmental Changes: Negative and Positive Impact on Human Health Environmental changes have both negative and positive impacts on human health. While some effects are direct, others are hard to decipher.
• Negligence: Environmental Law This paper discusses negligence. Negligence is considered as a tort. Torts are laws that give remedies for wrongs that are done to other people especially if no contract exists.
• The Environmental Impacts of Consumption and Production The purpose of this essay is to show that people affect the environment negatively because of the social, cultural, and economic activities that they engage in regularly.
• The Impact of ICT on the Environment In a research paper titled “Powering Down…”, Simon Forge has presented his concerns about the current model of Information and Communications Technology.
• Environmental Issues in the United Arab Emirates This paper overviews the main environmental issues, ecological problem trends in the United Arab Emirates and which these trends will be in the future.
• The Environmental Impact of Bottled Water This paper examines the real situational effects on production of the bottled water to environmental degradation.
• The True Cost: Fast Fashion, Garment Workers, and Environment The True Cost is a documentary that shows the background of the fast-fashion world, where garment workers live in terrible conditions, facing poverty and a lack of safety.
• Environmental Management Problems and Challenges To realize a competitive advantage based on environmental management, companies must seek to develop strategies that translate actions into benefits.
• Human Ecological Footprint Impact on Environment The term “human footprint” focuses on the continued use of the earth’s resources for survival. Human activities tend to have copious impacts on the natural environment.
• Rice Production and Its Impact on the Environment Rice is a major staple crop that millions of people use in their daily diets, particularly those living below the poverty line in Asia, Africa, and South America.
• Environmental and Global Security This essay applies the climate change theory to argue that environmental security our biggest global challenge for security today.
• Social and Environmental Impact of Burberry’s and Gucci’s Business Operations While Burberry’s influence on the macro social environment is rather positive, it is not possible to say the same about its environmental effect.
• Environmental Impact of Rice Production Mass production of rice releases harmful greenhouse gases into the environment and consumes a huge amount of water thus affecting productivity which has started to decrease.
• Bamboo Toothbrush: The Environmental Benefits Because bamboo toothbrushes are typically handcrafted with minimal use of manufacturing equipment, it significantly reduces the use of power in the manufacturing process.
• Environmental Ethics in Oryx and Crake by Atwood The central narrative line in Margaret Atwood’s dystopian tragedy Oryx and Crake is built around the story of a man named Snowman.
• Environmental Issues in the Hospitality Industry: An Actual Trend Environmental issues are an important challenge for the modern world, and the hospitality business is one of the fields where those issues are strongly marked.
• Environmental Crises Facing the Globe This paper will address the question of resolving the environmental crises within the existing international society.
• Nightingale’s Environmental Theory This essay will discuss Nightingale’s environmental theory in the context of Mrs. Adams, 68, suffering from diabetes, hypertension, and recently undergoing breast surgery.
• Greta Thunberg – Teenage Environmental Activist This paper will analyse Greta Thunberg as a teenage environmental activist and discuss the impact of her activities on the media.
• Environment and Tourism in the Caribbean Caribbean Island relies on sea-sand and sun tourism, making a mon-product area. Furthermore, these supporting endowments are subject to exhaustion.
• Microplastics and Environmental Health The environment suffers from microplastics (further referred to as MPs) released by the degraded synthetic clothing, cosmetics, plastic bags, bottles, and containers.
• Waste Disposal: Environmental Issue Environmental issues are a common occurrence worldwide, with new patterns emerging every day. It is important to note that humans are the main actors in environmental issues.
• Environmental Policy and Sustainability The culture of different people is one of the factors that make it difficult for the environmentalists to achieve solutions to some of the environmental problems.
• Global Environmental Issue in the 21st Century The environmental issue is perhaps the greatest of the global challenges and will still remain a challenge even in the 21st century.
• Environmental Issues in the Hospitality Industry In the hospitality industry, one needs to look at the activities that contribute negatively to the environment. The golf industry is one of the most popular sports activities.
• Florence Nightingale’s “Environmental Model” Critique Nightingale’s model mostly described how nurses must take care of their patients and what environment they must create in order to perform a proper treatment.
• Environmental Studies: Deep Ecology Deep ecology shows the idea that like every human being all other living beings should have equal right to live in this world
• Environmental Pollution: Causes and Consequences Environmental pollution is currently one of the most important and prevalent issues in modern life. Every day, a human appears to contribute to the pollution of our green world.
• Corporate Social Responsibility: Environmental Impact This paper discusses corporate social responsibility (CSR) efficiency from the perspective of companies’ environmental impact.
• Protection of Marine Environment Under International Law: Treaties and International Legal Instruments Laws touching on the protection of the marine environment have evolved. The evolution is made evident in this paper by analyzing the various international legal instruments.
• Environmental and Social Sustainability Sustainability development is an essential topic in the contemporary world because it helps identify problems experienced in various social settings.
• Environmental Factors and Barriers to Health Environmental health is an important aspect of health care. A variety of environmental factors can lead to both positive and negative outcomes for the patient.
• Water Recycling: Why Is It Important? Different countries face varying challenges in as far as provision of clean water to its population is concerned depending with its economic development level and geographic location.
• The Life’s Extreme Environments Evidence of life prevailing in nature’s extremities has been found, which gives humans hope to find life beyond planet Earth.
• Life Cycle Assessment of Environmental Impact This paper examines the Life Cycle Assessment essential components using the example product of tea manufacturing.
• Human Impact on the Environment Leading to Climate Change An elevated amount of greenhouse gases results in the retention of solar energy in the low levels of the atmosphere, which in turn brings to the melting of glaciers.
• Human Impact on Evolution and Environment Research on positive and negative impacts of humans on evolution and industrial development on the environment.
• Environmental Impacts of Events This strategic critical analysis has a mandate to evaluate the role of an event manager in curbing or reducing the environmental impacts on such occasions.
• Fossil Fuel as a Significant Concern to the Environment Fossil fuel is one of the significant energy sources in the world. This does not eliminate this source of heat as a significant concern to the environment.
• The Relations Between Environmental and Cultural Determinism This paper identifies environmental and cultural determinism, which, despite some contradictions, in certain interpretations can be closely related.
• Environmental Issues in the Third World Countries Environmentalism is a type of social movement or a broad philosophy that is geared towards the conservation of the environment and also seeks to improve the quality of the environment.
• Teaching Science, Technology, Society and Environment Using Out-of-School This paper looks at STSE in both contexts of theory and practical application. The STSE is, therefore, an advantageous and evidently a defensible objective in real practice.
• Environmental Issues and Protecting the Environment Protection of our environment should be a huge concern for people because our population is doubling, no, tripling faster than our environment can keep up.
• Hazardous Materials, Environment and Health The development of the technological advance resulted not only in the impressive progress but also affected the environment and human health by producing hazardous materials.
• Environmental and Public Health Risks Caused by Plastic Pollution Plastic toxicity is an issue globally. Vulnerability to harmful chemicals used in the manufacture of plastics has detrimental repercussions for human health.
• Chilean Sea Bass on the Menu and Its Impact on the Environment Restaurants have types of menus that customers choose from depending on their tastes. The paper will evaluate the environmental effects of having Chilean sea bass on the menu.
• Review of Environmental History Human impact on the environment is global: the influence of humans on the appearance of the planet is already comparable to the processes in the Earth’s core and continental drift.
• Environmental Sustainability: Protection of the Surroundings Sustainability is the avoidance of natural resource depletion to maintain biodiversity and ecological balance. It factors how people can protect the natural world from destruction.
• Nightingale’s Environmental Nursing Theory Nightingale’s environmental theory is a vital nursing theory that discusses the impact of the physical healthcare setting on patient health.
• Environmental Festivals and Fairs: Function and Importance Environmental festivals and fairs play a pivotal role in instilling on participating individuals a desire and attitude geared towards sustainable environmental management.
• Health Effects of Environmental Change The paper will describe how both food scarcity and obesity increase due the modern environment.It describes the roles of a nurse in ensuring a healthy environment.
• Human Population Growth and Environment The article argues, as a result, with an increasing trend in the human population, there are negative impacts on the environment.
• Environmental Marketing: Fiji Greenwashing Ad In the industry, greenwashing is described as a brand’s unjustifiable and deceptive assertion that its product is more ecologically friendly than it is.
• Microplastics as an Environmental Safety Issue One of the priorities of today’s ecologists, biotechnologists, community activists, and environmentalists is the problem of microplastic pollution.
• Hospitality Environmental Management Plan This paper aims at highlighting some of the ISO requirements with respect to site selection, environmental design, alternative materials, water conservation, and energy efficiency.
• Ecofeminism, Pluralism and Environmental Pragmatism Ecofeminism, pluralism, and environmental pragmatism are some of the concepts governing environmental protection.
• F. Nightingale’s Environmental Nursing Theory While working as a nurse, Nightingale noticed that environmental conditions affected the rate at which patients died following injuries sustained during the Crimean War.
• Environmental Conservation Project Management Understanding emerging technologies would help a firm gain a competitive edge over other firms. This project is focused on environmental conservation.
• National Parks: Environmental Threats and Protection Walker and David argue that every person is required to protect the endangered species because they have a duty to protect the earth, including these birds, for future generations.
• Meat Consumption: Environmental Impact Meat consumption is detrimental to the ecosystem because the production and utilization of animal meals strain the world’s freshwater resources.
• Activities to Promote and Preserve the Environment This paper describes a project that can be used to promote environmental preservation in schools and communities.
• Environmental Benefits and Challenges of Urbanization Discussion of environmental challenges and benefits of urbanization that can accure to environment because of urbanization.
• Environmental Ethical Issues: History, Current Events, and Significance Environmental ethics exerts its influence on several disciplines such as sociology, law, theology, economics, geography and ecology.
• Protecting the Environment as the Most Important Problem The rising population exhaust the natural resources such as the fossil fuels which when used; they in turn pollute the environment and raises energy security concerns.
• The Issue of Environment Pollution in Peru For their scavenger habits, the Peruvians use black vultures, or coragyps atrarus. This species is extensive in population and does not fall under special protection.
• Environmental Issues in Namibia Due to Rössing Uranium Mine The study focuses on the Rössing uranium mine, as uranium is one of the most toxic substances and its mining significantly worsens the standard of living of the population.
• Environmental Hazards That Humans Face Humans face various environmental hazards, and since they live in symbiosis with nature, they have to find solutions that could prevent pollution initiated by them.
• Environmental Problems and Their Potential Solutions People should think about items and the amounts of food they require as unnecessary products and waste food not only occupy large spaces but pollutants for the environment.
• Environmental Issues: Biodiversity Loss The loss of biodiversity is an environmental problem that needs urgent intervention since it threatens livelihoods.
• Arizona Tourism: Socio-Cultural and Environmental Impacts Tourism has become one of the leading ways of sustaining Arizona’s economy. Through the industry has lead to economic growth in the region, but there are worries concerning social well-being.
• Environmental Theory by Florence Nightingale Nightingale’s efforts are the groundwork of nursing studies and practice. She is the earliest nursing theorist, with the Environmental Theory being one of her most notable ones.
• Penguins and Environmental Changes Because of the lack of knowledge about penguins, people tend to overlook the threats to which they are subjected regularly due to environmental changes.
• Environmental Activism: Benefits and Threats Environmental activism increases public awareness about the problems; however, it can be justified only when it does not pose a threat to the property and lives of people.
• Bottled Water Impacts on Environment As the use of bottled water continue to rise steadily around the world, many critics have focused on its impacts on the environment, economy and other social implications related to the use.
• Florence Nightingale’s Environmental Theory This paper explores Florence Nightingale’s Environmental Theory in an attempt to demonstrate its timelessness insofar as its relevance to the nursing profession is concerned.
• Food Donation and Food Safety: Environmental Health Food safety is often taken for granted, with most people relying on basic practices and following essential hygiene standards without giving a second thought.
• Climate Change and Environmental Anxiety Individuals must develop a strategy to be able to resist climate change. In addition, there is a need for a global plan to restrain the influence of global warming.
• The Problem of Environmental Water Pollution This paper discusses a public health concern by explaining the causes of water pollution, how it affects human communities, and the possible strategies.
• Protection of the Environment in the U.S. and the State of Hawaii In the following paper, the initiatives for the protection of the environment in the U.S. and the State of Hawaii will be investigated.
• Environmental Analysis of the Ford Motor Company’s Electric Vehicles The paper provides the findings of a SWOT analysis of Ford company to detect its competitive advantage in the market of electric vehicles.
• Environmental Pollution: Causes and Solutions Pollution of the oceans, depletion of the ozone layer, and air quality in large cities adversely affect the health of people and animals.
• Solar Power as a Solution to Environmental Problems The paper discusses solar power, argues that it is better than wind and nuclear energy, and explains its benefits and connection with climate change.
• Environmental Problems in Today’s Belarus Environmental problems in today’s Belarus go back to the times of the Soviet regime. An agrarian republic, Belarus suffered from one of the biggest tragedies of the 20th century.
• Environmental Migration in the Rural Areas of Bangladesh This paper provides a case study to clarify the current situation with environmental migration in rural Bangladesh since the region faces floods, scarcity of drinking water.
• Environment and Health Relationship This paper aims to explain the relationship between health and the environment through a succinct analysis and identification of five objectives of epidemiology.
• The Impact of Food Choices on the Economy and Environment I decided to research two food products: salmon fillet and orange juice. I will utilize the data collected to reflect upon how food choices can impact the economy and environment.
• Energy Consumption in Architecture and Environmental Design Energy conservation can be considered as one of the fundamentals of energy consumption in architecture and environmental designs.
• Water: An Often Overlooked Essential Element in Our Environment The freshwater required for growing food and livestock is also in great demand by the large numbers of inhabitants in the world’s cities and towns.
• Quality & Environmental Management for Business Excellence The literature review discusses the role of quality management and environmental management accreditation standards in improving or sustaining business excellence.
• Environmental Issues: Plastics in the Ocean The circular economy encourages recycling and reuse and this approach could be used effectively to mitigate the problem of plastic marine pollution in the long term.
• Solar Energy and Its Impact on Environment The purpose of this paper is to determine the impact of solar energy on the environment. The major positive impact is the minimal emission of greenhouse gases.
• Population, Urbanization, and Environment The boom of urbanization came during the second half of the 20th century, when the world’s urban population almost doubled, from 29 to about 61%.
• Professionalism and Ethics in Environment This paper discusses the Challenger Disaster case, legal and standards for environmental contamination, and environmental impacts on non human living things.
• How the Concept of Brahman-Atman Can Benefit Human-Environment Relationship The concept of brahman-atman can serve as a foundation for a more progressive view of the relationship between people and the environment.
• The Urban Development Impact on the Environment This research paper discusses urban development and its potential negative effects on wildlife and the environment.
• Application of Environment Theory Florence Nightingale’s Environmental Theory is chosen for assignment: its concepts and their application to practice will be discussed in the paper.
• Analytical Approaches to the Environment Dikes are constructed out of the need for people to anticipate, mitigate, and control changes to the environment, specifically water management.
• Disciplines of Environmental Science Environmental sciences study the environment surrounding us to understand the relationship between various aspects of life for research and maintaining sustainable habitats.
• “Class and Environmental History” by Karl Jacoby: Summary and Arguments “Class and Environmental History” by Karl Jacoby critically examines class relations between conservationists and the ‘backwoodsmen’ of the Adirondacks.
• The Problem of Environmental Pollution: Fresh Water One of the more important concerns that are fast becoming a major threat is pollution and no form of pollution seemed to be bigger than that of freshwater pollution.
• Environmental Law and Its Crucial Points Environmental law’s meaning lies in the inseparable, logically, and scientifically grounded unity of legal regulation of all social relations regarding nature.
• Environmental Racism and Environmental Justice One should not tolerate that a certain percentage of city residents live in much worse environmental conditions than all others – it is necessary to modernize the industry.
• Cities as Social and Environmental Systems Despite the seeming unacceptability of urban spaces to the Earth’s natural background, civil ecosystems have gradually blended into the landscape.
• Possible Godzilla’s Existence Environmental Benefits This paper explains what if Godzilla existed, it would bring more benefits to the environment than destruction.
• Environmental Issues: Intensive Farming Intensive farming as an issue involves factors such as overgrazing, inappropriate methods during the preparation of land for farming for example slashing of bushes, etc.
• Buncefield Oil Depot Explosion and Its Environmental Impact On December 11 the year 2005, a great explosion occurred at the Buncefield Oil Depot that caused a lot of damage. There was no capability in fighting the fire in an effective way.
• Environmental Planning Models by Hostovsky Hostovsky’s models of environmental planning include the rational comprehensive model, the advocacy model, the adaptive model, the participatory model, and the incremental model.
• Pope Francis Views on the Environment In Laudato Si’ Pope Francis addresses the danger of polluting our planet and urges people to be more environmentally cautious.
• Packaging in Marketing, Food Safety, Environment The principal functions of packaging are protecting products from the deterioration and external influences and providing important nutritional and marketing information.
• Bottled Water Impact on Environment This paper seeks to amplify the need for regulation of the used water bottles. It is quite obvious that water bottles are the highest in a number of all bottles thrown away after use.
• Mining as a Cause of Environmental Disaster Mining does great damage to the environment and biological diversity of the planet. The negative consequences of mining indicates the gravity of the present ecological situation.
• Environmental & Best Safety (EBS) in China The given article EBS in China, written by Lin Liu and colleagues in 2018, explores the company Environmental & Best Safety (EBS), its background, and initiatives.
• Environmental Justice Movement Many social activities have taken place throughout the history of humankind is named Environmental Justice Movement.
• Benefits, Limitations, and Environmental Costs of Wind and Solar Power Renewable energy is seen to be crucial for enhancing energy security by reducing dependence on fossil fuels and lowering greenhouse gas emission.
• Environmental Ethics and Spiritual Dimensions Environmental messaging is a subject of great importance. This paper argues that adding a religious dimension would help bring more people to care about the environment.
• Environmental Studies: Importance of Environmental Studies Environmental studies are greatly related to a person’s life. It makes it important to understand the course of action for the planet’s and humanity’s future.
• Qanat Quartier: Architecture, Infrastructure, and Environment Qanat Quartier is a quarter that was built for rich local and foreign residents, with the expectation of large investments in order to cover the maintenance of the human-made isle.
• The Environmental Impacts of the Food and Hospitality Industry The food wastage issue in the food and hospitality industry in Australia remains to be consciously considered as it may adversely affect the environment.
• Environmental Justice as Social Movement Environmental justice is a social movement that promotes fair treatment and equal opportunities for all populations.
• Green Technology: Comparison of Economic and Environmental Implications It is essential to investigate the distribution of the implication perspectives of green technologies for economic and environmental domains.
• Flood Environmental Issues in the Netherlands With the current constantly rising sea levels, the Netherlands is at constant risk of floods, and those calamities were harsh incentives for the country’s development.
• Environmental Studies: Critical Thinking The article “Impacts of the 1945 and 1995-1996 Ruapehu Eruptions, New Zealand” by Johnston et al. (2000) examines the negative consequences of two volcanic eruptions.
• Burberry Firm’s Environmental Scanning and Sustainable Marketing The environmental scanning of Burberry indicates the need for sustainable marketing, given the range of messages regarding overconsumption that the marketing framework sends.
• The Documentary “Origins of Us”: Environmental Psychology The documentary “Origins of us” would help understand environmental psychology since it explains a lot about the interdependence between species and the environment.
• Environmental Issues: Problems of Climate Change The paper states that climate change poses a threat to the planet in various forms, including vital impacts on health, food, water, and air.
• Social and Environmental Reporting: Arguments Against
• Application of Chemistry in Environmental Science
• The Importance of Solving a Social Issue of Environmental Plastic Pollution
• Environmental Trends and Family
• Water Quality Assessment. Environmental Impact
• The Effect of Climate Change on the Environment
• Modern Environmental Issues: Climate Change
• Environmental Security and Environmental Degradation Consequences
• Impact of COVID-19 Pandemics on the Environment
• Automobiles’ Fuel Efficiency and the Environment
• Regional Environmental Focus On the Carribean
• Energy Conservation in the Environment
• Environmental Health Promotion in Nursing
• United Kingdom Environmental and Waste Management Policies
• Causes and Effects of Global Warming on the Environment
• Environment: Heal the Bay Experience
• Geopolitics, Land Use, and Environmental Impact
• The Environment and Social Justice
• Coaching Styles’ Role in Business Environment
• Climate Change: Canada’s Environment Policy
• Environmental Biology: Green Energy
• Environmental Health Problems Florida Facing
• Environmental Wellness and Problem of Air Pollution
• Gamma-Ray and Environmental Problems
• Ecological Model in Environmental Public Health
• Environmental Samples Gamma Ray Spectroscopic Analysis
• Is Bottled Water Dangerous for People and the Environment?
• Schieffelin: Rainforest Environment and the Kaluli Food Production
• Energy-Efficient Architecture and Environmental Design
• Sloy Hydro Power Station Project’s Environmental Impact
• Bottled Water: Environmental and Cultural Impact
• Overpopulation and Environmental Protection in China
• Environmental Factors Affecting Global and Domestic Marketing Decisions
• Gasoline Consumption Statistics and Reduction of Environmental Pollution
• Environmental Degradation as a Result of Growing Population
• Environmental Management Approaches and Waste Audit
• Environmental Protection Agency’s Guerrilla Tactics
• The WWF’s Environmental Advertisement on Marine and Ocean Pollution
• Environmental Change Effects on Health
• Iron Ore Industry and Environmental Pollution
• The B.E.A.C.H. Environmental Campaign
• Christianity Role in Positive Environmental Changes
• Environmental Pollution Effects on Health
• Environment: Accidents and Catastrophes
• Globalization and Use of Fossil Fuel as Environmental Threats
• Environmental Crisis and Plantation Legacies
• Aspects of the Environmental Activism
• Environmental Health’s Role in Public Health
• World Health Organization: Response to Health and Environmental Issues
• The Impact on the Environment of Transporting Freight Through Tractor Trailer
• Environmental Health Care: A Common Cause of Lead Exposure
• Environmental Impact of Genetically Modified Crop
• Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta: Environmental Management
• Environmental Degradation and Renewable Energy
• Environmental Issues: Air Pollution
• Environmental Change Management at Signal Sausages Factory
• The Ugly History of Environmental Fears and Population Controls
• The Environment and Its Current and Projected Aspects
• The Permian Basin from Environmental Perspective
• Food Insecurity and Associated Environmental Issues in Sub-Saharan Africa
• The Tragedy of the Commons in the New Environmental Reality
• Assessing Environmental Risks from Human Activity
• The Greenhouse Effect on Environment
• Environmental Ethics in Genetically Modified Organisms
• Environmental Impact Assessment: Japan
• Environmental Impact of Avocado Farming in Mexico
• Environment, Economy and Society in World History
• Implementation of Environmental Tax and Related Economic Instruments
• Food Security: Environmental Health and Preventive Medicine
• Environmental Management and Sustainable Solutions
• Acid Rains: Environmental Economics and Management
• Research Project on Environmental Pollution in Brooklyn
• Lasting Environmental Impacts of Industrial Revolution
• Environmental Sustainability and Ecological Risks
• Choice of Paper or Plastic in Environmental Context
• Environmental Health and Biodiversity
• Native Americans: The Value of Environmental and Cultural History
• Waste Pollution as a Global Environmental Problem
• Environment Protection, Species Conservation, and Forest Management
• The Impact of Parks on Biodiversity, Local Environment, and Local Economy
• The Environment in the South Caucasus
• The Basics of Environmental Ethics
• Environment: There’s Something in the Water
• Environmental Pollution in China
• Environmental Degradation in Pacific Northwest
• Advocacy Regarding Environmental Pollution in Brooklyn
• Management Development and Management Environment
• Environmental Racism as Rights Infringement
• Agricultural Adaptation to Changing Environments
• The 2010 Oil Spill in the Gulf of Mexico: Environmental and Policy Issues
• Ecology and Environmental Science: Analysis of Videos
• Nonverbal Message on Environmental Features
• Environmental and Conservation Efforts Social Movement
• Microbial-Environmental Interactions: Escherichia Coli
• Aspects of Environmental Sustainability
• Politics in the Upkeep of a Sustainable Quality Environment
• The Effects of the Environment on First Peoples and Their Future After Europeans’ Arrival
• Environment-Oriented Approach in Consumer Decisions
• Human-Environment Interactions Influence Populations’ Health
• Importance of Recycling for Environment and People
• Impact of Marine Plastic Debris on Environment
• Biodiversity, Environmental Ethics and Theology
• Sustainable Environmental Practices, Current Status and Recommendations
• The Affect of Climate Change on the Social and Environmental Determinants of Health
• Stakeholders and the Physical Environment
• “Environmental Drivers of Sexual Dimorphism…” by Chelini
• Environmental Protection: Perspectives on World Religions
• Pollution Rights Trading Will Effectively Control Environmental Problems
• Environmental Justice Problems in the Global South
• Cooperation of Government and People, Business and Environment
• Environmental Studies: Life & Culture in the Pacific
• Von Wong on Environmental Pollution Awareness
• Built Environment and Pandemics
• Environmental Justice Issues in Miami
• Overpopulation and the Environmental Wellbeing
• The Effects of Globalization on the Environment
• Environmental Conditions Analysis
• Virtue Ethics. The Environmental Documentary
• “Promises and Poverty”: Starbucks Conceals Poverty and Deterioration of the Environment
• Human Negative Impact on the Environment
• The FISHstory Project in Environmental Studies
• Global Environment and Critical Threats to It
• Environmental Considerations in Purchasing Transportation Services
• Biodiversity on the Earth: Why Is It Crucial for the Environment?
• The Drastic Effects of Human Pollution on the Environment
• Environment and Health Relation
• The Evolution and Purpose of Contemporary Environmental Health
• Hydraulic Fracturing: Effects on the Environment
• Analysis of Environmental Racism in America
• Impacts of Environmental Justice on Health
• The Protest Against the Environment-Related Policy
• Environmental Racism: Analyzing the Phenomenon
• Overpopulation’s and Environmental Disasters’ Connection
• Stem Cell: Environmental Science
• Environmental Treaties in Addressing Climate Change
• Bacterial Growth Requirements in Different Environments
• Environmental Impact for Nuclear Power Plant in Uganda
• Impact of Environmental Law on Businesses
• The Anthropocene: Human Impacts on the Environment
• Studying Human Impact on the Environment
• Aspects of Environmental Protection
• How Changes in the Environment Affect Organizations
• The Children’s Health: Impact of Environmental Problems
• Trans-ocean Transportation: Environmental Study
• Environmental Justice Framework and Racism
• Food, Health and Environment Relations
• Modelling in the Marine Environment
• Implication of International Environmental and Social Safeguard in Urban Transportation Project
• Environmental Law Application in the Contemporary World
• Environmental Public Health: Excessive Noise Levels in Ginning Industries
• The Environmental Issues Significant Impact on Health
• Environmental Health Status of Population
• Environmental Health and Environmental Change
• Acme Hydrocarbons Ltd.’s Environmental Law Case
• Environmental Ethics. Technology and Values
• The U.S. Environmental Protection
• Environmental & Economic Benefit Analysis of Methane Capture for Energy Generation
• The Effects of the Environment on Human Health
• Florence Nightingale’s Environment Theory
• Environmental Sustainability Over Economic Development in the Amazon Forest
• Plastics and Environmental Protection in Europe
• Green Criminology: Environmental Harm in the Niger Delta
• COVID-19 Pandemic’s Impact on the Environment
• Health and Environment Change in the USA
• The Problems of West Carolina Environmental Protection Agency
• How Pollution Affects Humans and Environment
• Whole-Cell Bacterial Biosensor for Environmental Monitoring
• The Environmental Monitoring: Policies, Procedures and Schedules
• Environmental Law: International Agreements
• Environmental Law: Property, Law, and Territorial Resources Relations
• Environmental Conditions in Proxima C
• Environmental Impact of Offshore Drilling
• Overcoming Racism in Environmental Decision Making
• Relationship Between Men and the Environment
• Globalization and Related Environmental Issues
• Environmental Protection: Non-Equilibrium-Plasma-Assisted MNO2 Filter Efficiency
• Interference With Environment and Environmental Changes
• Concentrated Brine Discharge Effect to Seawater on the Aquatic Environment
• Environmental Ethics: Intrinsic Value of Objects
• Food and Sustainable Environmental Issues in Campus
• Trade Liberalization: Environmental Effects
• Earth in Mind: On Education, Environment, and the Human Prospect
• Environmental Philosophy: Mountain Top Removal
• Alfred W. Crosby on the Environment Exchange
• Environmental Management: Nature Conservation Planning
• Chernobyl Disaster’s Socio-Economic and Environmental Impact
• Trade in Environmental Goods and Economic Growth
• Environmental Ethical Issues and Current Situation
• Environmental Disaster Education: Incorporation Into the University Curriculum
• Environmental Management System: Implementation, Maintenance, and Improvement
• Environmental Pollution Impact and Ways to Reduce It
• Marine Environmental High Risk Areas Definition
• Environmental Management Plan: Managing the Hospitality Context
• The Economics of Race, Agriculture and Environment
• The Role of Environmental Management in Company
• The Importance of Documentation in Environmental Management
• Concept of Energy Consumption in Environmental Design
• Environmental Studies: The Importance of Oil Exploration
• Environmental Impact of International Tourism
• Ethics on Environment: Practical and Theoretical Constructs
• Environment: Rapid Increasing in Industrialization and Globalization
• Environmental Challenges for NAFTA and Their Solutions
• Research Environmental Discrimination and Environmental Justice
• Ineos Chemical Company Performance & Environmental Risks
• Questions on Environmental Ethics Concerns
• The Impact of Technological Advances on the Environment
• Environmental Issues and Ethics: The Questions
• Water and Soil Pollution: Effects on the Environment
• Commercial Fishing: Environmental Ethics Case Study
• Bottled Water: Culture and Environmental Impact
• Behavior and Environmental Influences on It
• Bioremediation Technology Against Environmental Pollution
• Ethics and Environmental Situation in China
• Chuck Plunkett “Prius Effect”: Energy Efficient Cars Harmful Effects on the Environment
• Lack of Water in California as an Environmental Issue
• Ansel Adams’s Environmental Philosophy in Photos
• Environment Protection Authority and Chemical Waste
• Environmental Health: Carbon Monoxide Poisoning
• Environmental Health and Effects of Nursing
• Environmental Health, Barriers and Nursing Role
• Environmental Health and Nurses’ Contribution
• Toxic Air Pollutants: Environmental Health
• Pollution Impact on the Environment
• Carbon Cowboys: Environmental Protection & Energy Efficiency
• Environment and Development Changes in Society
• Social Psychologists and the Environment Studying
• Industrial Pollution and Environmental Regulation
• Land Use, Zoning, and Environmental Quality Review
• Environmental Policy and Governance in Australia
• Environmental Problems and Social Movements
• Green Approach: Environment Conservation
• Navigating Environmental Attitudes: Environmental Preservation
• “Human and Environmental Security: An Agenda for Change” by Dodds & Pippard
• HindelburgeCement Plant’s Environmental Impact
• Carbon Tax Role in Enhancing Environmental Sustainability
• Regulatory Economics and Environmental Policies
• Colin Ives’ Lectures on Artwork-Environment Interaction
• Global Awareness of Environmental and Moral Issues
• World Environmental Politics: Biocentric and Anthropocentric Views on Environmental Issues
• Naturalists and Their Environmental Experiences
• National Environmental Policy Act in the US
• Environment and Legislation Issues
• Environmental Legislation in the US and India
• Land Use and Environmental Ethics
• Society, Environment and Technology: Indian Market Entering
• Environmental Health and Social Conflicts
• Environmental Skepticism in Scientific Community
• Environmental Changes and Factors That Impact Health
• Pollution and Noise as Environmental Health Issues
• Local Environments in Delaware
• Environmental Health Concerns in Healthy People 2020
• Richmond Plastics Products and Environmental Issue
• Environmental Health and Effects of Environmental Change
• Man and Environment: Overpopulation in China
• Biodiversity, Global Warming, Environmental Conservation
• Cultural Variations in Environment and Biology: AIDS
• Nurse’s Role in Environmental Health Improvement
• How Changes in the Environment Affect Organizations?
• Potential Sources of Environmental Risks
• The Environmental Valuation in Economic Terms
• Environmental Legislation: Clean Water Act
• US Environmental Protection Agency’s Budgeting
• American Environmental Policy for Hazardous Waste
• Environmental Health as to Healthy People 2020
• National Environmental Action Plan of Maldives
• Global Environmental Changes: Population’ Growth
• Consumption, Cheep Labor and Environmental Concerns
• West Kendall: Environment and Community
• Belo Monte Dam Project Environmental Controversies
• Environment Protection in the U.S. and the Hawaii State
• Environmental Health and Health Effects: Improvement Strategies
• Environment in the Book “Paths to a Green World”
• “The Corn is a Lie” – Environment
• Water Scarcity Issue and Environment
• Global Environmental Change Concepts
• Environmental Studies: Water Recycling
• Global Environmental Change
• Environmental Studies of Global Warming: Cause and Mitigation
• Natural Sciences: Development vs. Environment
• Environmental Studies: The Chernobyl Disaster
• Environmental Studies: The Global Warming Holocaust
• Environmental Studies: Tragedy of the Commons
• Globe Environment Communities and Industrialization
• Environmental Studies: Plastics Recycling and Recovery
• Environmental Studies on Coral Reefs
• Environment: Oil Drilling in the Arctic National Refuge
• Can the United States Government Overcome the Negative Impacts of the Industrial Revolution on the Environment?
• What Are the Impacts of Climate Change on the Environment and Society?
• How Does Changing the Environment Affect Evolution?
• Does Economic Integration Damage or Benefit the Environment?
• Are Genetically Modified Crops More Harmful Than Beneficial to the Environment?
• How Does Cigarette Smoke Affect the Environment?
• Did Our Ancestors Live in Harmony With the Environment?
• Are Green Payments Good for the Environment?
• Why Is It Important to Take Care of Our Environment?
• Are Hybrid Cars Becoming Safer or More Harmful to the Environment?
• Does Buying Local Organic Grown Foods Help the Environment?
• What Are 10 Ways to Keep Our Environment Clean?
• Are Trade Integration and the Environment in Conflict?
• Does Education Induce People to Improve the Environment?
• How Can We Keep Our Environment Clean?
• Are Voluntary Environment Programs Effective in Improving the Environmental Performance?
• Does Corruption Matter for the Environment?
• How Has Climate Change Affected the Environment?
• Should Businesses Take Responsibility for the Environment?
• Does Human Fertility Adjust to the Environment?
• What Should Companies Do to Protect the Environment?
• How Do the African States Deal With the Relationship Between Environment and Development?
• Does People’s Activity Harm the Environment?
• Who Is Responsible to Save the Environment?
• How Does Consumerism Affect the Environment?
• Will Trade Liberalization Harm the Environment?
• Does the Natural Environment Have a Future?
• How Is Detrimental Clear-Cut Logging Affecting the Environment?
• What Role Should the Government Play in Protecting the Environment?
• How Did the Arrival of Europeans Affect the Environment of North America?

Cite this post

• Chicago (N-B)
• Chicago (A-D)

StudyCorgi. (2021, September 9). 485 Environment Essay Topics. https://studycorgi.com/ideas/environment-essay-topics/

"485 Environment Essay Topics." StudyCorgi , 9 Sept. 2021, studycorgi.com/ideas/environment-essay-topics/.

StudyCorgi . (2021) '485 Environment Essay Topics'. 9 September.

1. StudyCorgi . "485 Environment Essay Topics." September 9, 2021. https://studycorgi.com/ideas/environment-essay-topics/.

Bibliography

StudyCorgi . "485 Environment Essay Topics." September 9, 2021. https://studycorgi.com/ideas/environment-essay-topics/.

StudyCorgi . 2021. "485 Environment Essay Topics." September 9, 2021. https://studycorgi.com/ideas/environment-essay-topics/.

These essay examples and topics on Environment were carefully selected by the StudyCorgi editorial team. They meet our highest standards in terms of grammar, punctuation, style, and fact accuracy. Please ensure you properly reference the materials if you’re using them to write your assignment.

This essay topic collection was updated on January 8, 2024 .

Environmental Science

Core environmental studies databases, full-text search, more resources.

• Reports, Tools & Data by Topic
• Books & Background Information

Finding full text

To access the full text of articles you find in our databases, click on the NYU library buttons.

Some examples:

• Environment Complete This link opens in a new window Environment Complete offers full text and indexing for domestic and international journals and monographs in the areas of agriculture, ecology, energy, environmental studies, and related fields.
• Agricultural & Environmental Science Database This link opens in a new window This database includes AGRICOLA, TOXLINE, ESPM (Environmental Sciences and Pollution Management) and Environmental Impact Statements (EIS) databases and provides full-text titles from around the world, including scholarly journals, trade and industry journals, magazines, technical reports, conference proceedings, and government publications. This database includes specialized, editorially-curated A&I resources covering such topics as the effects of pollution on people and animals and environmental action and policy responses.
• Web of Science Core Collection This link opens in a new window Web of Science Core Collection is a multidisciplinary citation index that includes scholarly articles, conference proceedings, and books in the biomedical, psychosocial, and arts and humanities. The collections contain Science Citation, Social Sciences Citation Index, Arts and Humanities Citation Index , Conference Proceedings Citation Index, Book Citation Index, Emerging Sources Citation Index and Current Chemical Reactions index.
• Scopus This link opens in a new window Scopus is a multidisciplinary index of peer-reviewed journals and conference proceedings.
• Biological & Agricultural Index Plus This link opens in a new window Biological & Agricultural Index Plus provides indexing and abstracting for domestic and international journals in Biology, Agriculture, and related fields, with coverage beginning in 1982. Full text is available for selected titles.

Most databases search only the title, abstract, and some descriptors added by the database or authors. In many cases, especially when looking for detailed methods, a search of the full-text of an article is best. The following resources may not be comprehensive in scope, but do allow full-text searching and may be a good complement to a search of a more focused subject database.

• Google Scholar This link opens in a new window Google Scholar is a central search for scholarly literature. It covers disciplines and sources, peer-reviewed papers, theses, books, abstracts and articles, from academic publishers, professional societies, preprint repositories, universities and other scholarly organizations.
• PubMed Central (PMC) Repository of full-text articles funded by many federal agencies including NIH.
• ScienceDirect This link opens in a new window ScienceDirect is a portal for scholarship published in the sciences, engineering, and technology disciplines.
• BioMed Central Journals This link opens in a new window BioMed Central is an independent publishing house committed to providing immediate open access to peer-reviewed biomedical research.
• Public Library of Science (PLoS) PLoS publishes a suite of open access science and medicine journals, including PLoS Biology and PLoS Genetics.

For a more comprehensive list of Environmental Studies databases, go to the Environmental Sciences Database List .

• << Previous: Home
• Next: Reports, Tools & Data by Topic >>
• Last Updated: Mar 13, 2024 3:40 PM
• URL: https://guides.nyu.edu/environment

• How we work

55 Remarkable Environmental Topics for Research Proposal

Explore the collection of great environmental research topics from field experts.

Environmental Research Topics: Features, Importance & Great Ideas

Environmental investigations entail investigating the natural world’s structure and function, the association between humans and the environment, and how people’s values, beliefs, and attitudes affect that association. Environmental research topics thus cover a wide range of subjects, including climate change, biodiversity, pollution, renewable energy, and sustainability.

How to Choose Environmental Topics for Research

Environmental investigations is a very broad field that offers a wide range of areas to investigate. So how can you choose a good one for your paper? First, always pick an issue from the area you are interested in. What is environmental science direction you’d like to develop? Working on your paper will be easier since you’ll be motivated to explore something you care about. From there, sort through your environmental topics for research to determine the following:

• Relevance – does the proposal theme address an environmental issue with significant societal implications, such as pollution or climate change?
• Originality –  does the investigation subject offer a new perspective on existing knowledge?
• Feasibility – are the environmental topics to research realistic and achievable based on the scope and your available resources?
• Scope – how broad is the matter of investigation? It shouldn’t be too broad or too narrow; it should be the right size to provide a comprehensive investigation.

When choosing environmental science research paper topics, avoid those that are too complex or require more resources and time than you can provide. Remember also to consider data availability, literature, funding, time, and ethical issues involved.

Environmental Topics for Research Paper Are Not Created Equal

Environmental science topics are created differently depending on your discipline, purpose, scope, and methodology. Thus, the approach used to formulate them differs as they will serve different purposes. For example, some are explanatory and will try to explain how something happens or works. Others will try to seek more knowledge about a subject(exploratory). Then, you might also encounter a few that compare and contrast two phenomena or situations.

When assessing investigation issues, carefully evaluate your goals and interests before committing to a specific one. Otherwise, you might get stuck. Luckily our research proposal writing services are always here to help you help to get out of even the most challenging situation!

The Most Actual Environmental Science Topics for an Excellent Proposal

Natural and human-made systems that shape our planet and affect its inhabitants are one of the most interesting areas to write a paper about. Check out these environmental topics for research paper to produce an engaging proposal.

1. Consequences of Climate Change Human Societies.

2. Challenges of Renewable Energy Technologies.

3. Recycling Initiatives and Their Implications on Reducing Pollution.

4. Challenges of Sustainable Management of Freshwater Resources.

5. The Impact of Low Air Quality on Human Health.

6. Effectiveness of Conservational Policies in Addressing Environmental Issues.

7. Impacts of Sustainable Transportation in Reducing Urban Ecological Footprint.

8. Effect of Marine Pollution on Marine Ecosystems.

9. Challenges Facing Sustainable Farming Practices.

10. Impacts of Electricity Generation on the Environment.

11. Ecological Hazards of Electronic Waste.

12. Tourism’s Negative Effect on Ecosystems.

Environmental science research topics are often flexible and can be broadened or narrowed down depending on the scope of your study.

Interesting Environmental Justice Topics

Environmental justice involves advocating for fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people in implementing environmental laws and policies. Here’re exciting environmental justice topics for a good proposal.

1. Effect of Hazardous Waste Facilities on Minority Communities.

2. The Influence of Air Pollution Exposure on the Health of Marginalized Populations.

3. Effect of Unequal Distribution of Parks and Green Spaces in Disadvantaged Neighborhoods.

4. Relationship Between Indigenous Communities and Conservation Efforts.

5. Influence of Climate Change on Vulnerable Communities.

6. Differential Impacts of Natural Disasters on Marginalized Populations.

7. The Importance of Environmental Education in Empowering Disadvantaged Communities.

8. Barriers to Equitable Access to Healthy and Sustainable Food Options in Marginalized Communities.

9. Geographical Inequalities in Accessing Clean Water.

10. The Intersection Between Food Justice and Ecological Concerns.

11. The Link Between Exposure to Pollutants Hazards and Adverse Health Outcomes in Socially Disadvantaged Groups.

12. Barriers to Equitable Distribution of Resources and Assistance During Post-disaster Recovery in Marginalized Communities.

The above can provide great options for a research proposal about environmental problems and how they affect specific populations.

Insightful Environmental Economics Research Topics

Environmental economics research topics aim to understand the human activities impacting on the natural environment and human welfare. So if you are looking for decent quantitative research ideas , consider the following offered by our experienced investigator.

1. Effectiveness of Economic Incentives in Promoting the Adoption of Renewable Energy Sources.

2. Effect of Pollution Regulations on Automobile Manufacturing Industry Competitiveness.

3. Factors Promoting Economic Growth in Green Industries and Sustainable Sectors.

4. The Economic Influence of Urban Sprawl on Environmental Quality.

5. Economic Implications of Water Scarcity.

6. Economic Incentives for Conserving Biodiversity.

7. Economic Benefits of Investing in Renewable Energy Technologies.

8. The Economic Viability of Strategies to Reduce Plastic Pollution.

9. Effectiveness of Carbon Pricing Mechanisms in Reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions.

10. Economic Consequences of Natural Disasters.

11. Economic Importance of Disaster Preparedness and Resilience.

12. Economic Benefits of Transitioning From a Linear to a Circular Economy Model Focused on Resource Efficiency and Waste Reduction.

13. Role of Green Finance & Sustainable Investments in Supporting Eco-Friendly Projects and Businesses.

14. Efficient Water Pricing Mechanisms to Encourage Conservation.

Captivating Environmental Biology Research Topics

Environmental biology research topics will often try to assess the interaction between living organisms and their natural or human-modified environments. Check out these interesting issues to investigate for your biology research proposal .

1. Ways in Which Climate Change Affects the Distribution and Habitat Suitability of Plants.

2. Relationship Between Biodiversity and Ecosystem Health.

3. Role of Keystone Species in Maintaining Ecosystem Processes.

4. Human Factors Contributing to the Decline of Endangered Species.

5. Ecological Effect of Invasive Species on Local Ecosystems.

6. Factors Contributing to Pollinator Decline.

7. Ecological Consequences for Plant-Pollinator Interactions and Food Security.

8. Ecological Effects of Microplastics in Freshwater and Marine Ecosystems.

9. Shifts in the Timing of Seasonal Events in Animals in Response to Climate Change.

10. Ways in Which Changes in Land Use Impact Biodiversity.

11. Ways in Which Deforestation Impacts Ecological Communities.

12. Effects of Agricultural Pollutants on Ecosystems.

13. Challenges of Ecotoxicological Risk Assessments.

14. Ways in Which Wildlife Populations Adapt to Urban Environments.

15. Effects of Conservation on Human-Wildlife Interactions.

16. The Impact of Rising Carbon Dioxide Levels on Coral Reef Ecosystems.

17. The Influence of Marine Tourism on Marine Biodiversity.

DOWNLOAD Here More Environmental Research Proposal Ideas!

Importance of choosing the right environmental research paper topics.

Choosing the proper investigation issue is crucial for the success and impact of your paper. Topics related to environment issues tend to be complicated and demand a thorough understanding of the natural and social dimensions of the problem. But with the right choice, the writing process is much easier and gives a better chance to produce a quality paper.

Poor environmental research paper topics will waste your time, resources and even cause frustration when investigators struggle to meet the word count. So, choose your subjects of investigation wisely or request expert help if you need extra support.

While the above topics for environmental research papers might prove useful, sometimes picking a subject of investigation and working on a proposal can be daunting. But you shouldn’t worry. We have a large team of experienced writers ready to work on your paper and final paper. You only need to send your instructions, and they’ll embark on the task.

We’re here to help with your proposal. So drop us a line anytime you may need professional assistance!

Upload Files

Thank you for your request!

We will get in touch with you shortly!

Please, try one more time.

Click through the PLOS taxonomy to find articles in your field.

For more information about PLOS Subject Areas, click here .

Loading metrics

Open Access

Peer-reviewed

Research Article

A Qualitative Study of Environmental Factors Important for Physical Activity in Rural Adults

* E-mail: [email protected]

Affiliation Menzies Institute for Medical Research, University of Tasmania, Hobart, Tasmania, Australia

Affiliation Centre for Rural Health, University of Tasmania, Hobart, Tasmania, Australia

Affiliation Centre for Physical Activity and Nutrition Research, School of Exercise and Nutrition, Sciences, Deakin University, Burwood, Victoria, Australia

• Verity Cleland, 
• Clarissa Hughes, 
• Lukar Thornton, 
• Alison Venn, 
• Kathryn Squibb, 

• Published: November 10, 2015
• https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0140659
• Reader Comments

Despite increasing evidence that the physical environment impacts on physical activity among urban-dwellers, little attention has been devoted to understanding this relationship in rural populations. Work in this area is further hindered by a lack of environmental measures specifically designed for rural settings. This qualitative study aimed to explore the salience of urban physical activity environment constructs among rural adults.

In 2011, 49 rural men and women from three distinct areas (coastal, animal-based farming, forestry/plant-based farming) of rural Tasmania, Australia, were purposively recruited to participate in semi-structured interviews. Interviews explored features of the built and social environment commonly examined in studies of urban adults, including functional characteristics (eg, lighting, footpaths, roads/verges), road and personal safety, availability and accessibility of places to be active, destinations, and aesthetics. Interviews were recorded, transcribed verbatim and analysed using a content-thematic approach using QSR NVivo software.

While some urban environmental constructs were salient to these rural adults, such as availability of and accessibility to places to be active, some constructs were operationalised differently, such as road safety (where large trucks and winding roads rather than traffic density was of concern), or were not considered relevant (eg, personal safety related to crime, availability of walkable destinations, aesthetics).

Conclusions

The measurement of the physical environment in rural populations may require reconsideration and/or modification to ensure salience and appropriate quantification of associations with physical activity in future studies.

Citation: Cleland V, Hughes C, Thornton L, Venn A, Squibb K, Ball K (2015) A Qualitative Study of Environmental Factors Important for Physical Activity in Rural Adults. PLoS ONE 10(11): e0140659. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0140659

Editor: Ruth Jepson, University of Edinburgh, UNITED KINGDOM

Received: October 24, 2014; Accepted: September 29, 2015; Published: November 10, 2015

Copyright: © 2015 Cleland et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited

Data Availability: All relevant data are within the paper and its Supporting Information files.

Funding: The University of Tasmania provided funding for this study. VC was supported by a National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Postdoctoral Training (Public Health) Fellowship, AV was supported by a NHMRC Fellowship (1008299), and KB was supported by a NHMRC Principal Research Fellowship (1042442).

Competing interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Introduction

Physical inactivity is one of the major modifiable risk factors for cardiovascular diseases, the leading cause of death in most Westernised countries [ 1 , 2 ], and is the fourth leading contributing factor to death worldwide [ 3 ]. In upper-middle- and high-income countries, the proportion of adults not meeting physical activity guidelines is estimated at 40–45%, [ 4 ] and is even higher in certain population groups, such as those living in rural areas [ 5 – 11 ]. Higher rates of physical inactivity observed in rural areas may contribute to explaining the lower life expectancies and poorer health outcomes of rural residents [ 5 , 12 ]. Understanding the factors that influence physical activity behaviour among rural adults is therefore an essential requirement for developing and implementing effective preventive programs and policies.

Social-ecological theories highlight the concurrent role of individual, social and environmental factors in influencing behaviour [ 13 ]. A review of 11 review papers investigating the physical environment and physical activity concluded that there are reasonably consistent associations between physical activity participation and access to physical activity facilities, convenient and proximate access to destinations, high residential density, land use, urban “walkability” scores, perceived safety, exercise equipment, and footpaths (and that these associations were relatively consistent between studies of total physical activity and of walking) [ 14 ]. A key limitation of these existing studies is that they have been mostly limited to urban or suburban populations. Consequently, many of the factors identified may have limited transferability to rural populations (e.g. urban walkability scores, high residential density, and convenient and proximate access to destinations). Despite this, most studies assessing associations between environments and health behaviours in rural communities have done so using environment exposure measures best applied to urban settings (e.g. [ 9 , 15 – 24 ]). This approach largely ignores the unique geographies of rural environments, which are characterised by large open spaces, low population densities, fewer facilities for activity, limited public transport, and large distances required to travel to places to be active [ 25 ]. As there is currently little evidence to guide the selection of appropriate measures of the physical activity environment in rural populations, this study used a qualitative approach to explore the salience of urban physical activity environment constructs among rural adults. To this end, in this paper we report the findings of the expectant (anticipated) themes related to the key environmental constructs explored.

Materials and Methods

This study was conducted during 2011, and followed the ‘Consolidated criteria for reporting qualitative research (COREQ)’ guidelines [ 26 ].

Ethics Statement

Approval to conduct the study was granted by the Tasmanian Social Sciences Human Research Ethics Committee, and informed written consent was obtained from all participants.

Participants

The Australian Standard Geographical Classification Remoteness Structure system [ 27 ] was used to classify all postcodes of Tasmania, Australia, as Major Urban, Inner Regional, Outer Regional, Remote and Very Remote. Two Outer Regional areas and one Remote area were purposefully selected to provide representation from across the state (north, central and south) and diversity in area types (eg, small coastal area, animal-based farming, and fruit-growing). The demographic profile of these areas is represented in Table 1 .

• PPT PowerPoint slide
• PNG larger image
• TIFF original image

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0140659.t001

Purposive sampling techniques were employed to recruit 34 women and 16 men aged 18–55 years from the 3 regions. Uneven numbers of women and men were included as a result of study resourcing: a greater amount of funding was obtained for interviews with women than for interviews with men. Recruitment strategies included advertisements in local newspapers, features on local radio, posters in key neighbourhood locations (such as libraries, community houses, neighbourhood centres) and through networks of key community contacts. Snowball sampling, whereby volunteering participants refer other eligible people to the project, was also employed.

Interview: A semi-structured interview schedule was developed to explore issues related to physical activity and the physical environment. Physical activity was defined as ‘any activity that lasts for at least 10 minutes and causes your body to work harder than normal—so your heart rate might go up, you might breathe a little heavier like huffing and puffing, and you might “warm up” a bit’. Through an open-ended questioning format, participants were asked to describe the intensity, duration and frequency of physical activity in the past two weeks at work (occupational), to get from place to place (transport), around the house/yard (domestic), and during leisure/discretionary/spare time (leisure).

Features of the built and social environment commonly examined in studies of urban adults [ 28 ] were explored, including functional characteristics (eg, lighting, footpaths, roads/verges), road and personal safety, availability and accessibility of places to be active, destinations, and aesthetics. Participants described these features, and whether they impacted on their physical activity. They were also asked whether there was anything else related to where they lived, their environment, or their physical activity that was not covered in the interview. The interview schedule was pilot-tested with two adults recruited via convenience from rural areas that were not targeted in this study, with minimal adjustments required.

Survey: Participants completed a brief demographic questionnaire including date of birth, language spoken at home, country of birth, highest qualification (and partner’s if applicable), employment status (and partner’s if applicable), marital status, number of children, access to a motor vehicle, injury/illness/disability that limits activity, height and weight. Body mass index (kg/m 2 ) was calculated and weight status classified using standard definitions of overweight (25-<30kg/m 2 ) and obesity (≥30kg/m 2 ).

Data Collection

Forty-five of the interviews were conducted by one female interviewer with qualifications in social work, women’s studies and environmental health. Four interviews were conducted by the lead author (female), a postdoctoral research fellow with qualifications in health promotion and epidemiology. Participants had no prior relationship with interviewers or the authors, and the goals of the research were clearly explained to participants prior to interview. Both interviewers followed the same semi-structured interview schedule. Interviews were conducted in community houses (n = 13), community health services (n = 5), community centres (n = 6), local council offices (n = 4), a participant’s home (n = 1), participants’ workplaces (n = 3), at the university (n = 7) or via telephone (n = 11). Interview length ranged from 27 to 62 minutes and lasted on average 43 minutes. Participants were provided the opportunity to review their transcript.

Data Analyses

Interviews were digitally recorded, transcribed verbatim and imported into NVivo software (QSR, version 8.0), which was used to assist in coding and analysing transcripts (see S1 – S5 Files). Data analysis involved one author (VC) reading and re-reading transcripts, listening to digital recordings, and thematic analysis of transcripts to identify common and contrasting ideas, supplemented by interpretive content analysis. Regular discussion and refinement of the themes occurred amongst the researchers and the interviewer/s. For this analysis, transcribed interviews were coded according to expectant themes (functional characteristics, road and personal safety, availability and accessibility, destinations, and aesthetics). Interpretive content analysis involves ‘counting’ the frequency of particular phrases or types of behaviour and provides numeric data that is useful in summarising findings. A second author (KS) verified coding of the expectant themes in a subsample of interviews (n = 10; 20%); any discrepancies were discussed until consensus was achieved, and deferment to a third author was not required.

Participant characteristics

Most participants were born in Australia, had medium/high levels of education, were employed, and were married/living as married ( Table 2 ). More than half had children living in the household, all had access to a motor vehicle, very few had an injury, illness or disability that prevented activity, and around a third of women and two thirds of men were classified as overweight. Participants were provided with the opportunity to raise any other issues, but none were raised, and no participants took the opportunity to review their transcript.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0140659.t002

Road safety.

Road safety was considered an issue by about two thirds of participants, similar to the urban literature. However, one of the most common reasons for poor road safety was the high number of trucks on local roads, which combined with narrow and winding roads was a concern for both men and women in all areas.

…once you go up on the main road you wouldn’t walk there for quids … it’s narrow and it’s tight…And we’ve had two or three deaths on it . And there’s trucks and there’s log trucks—and so you can’t really walk along it too much . [Male, Area 3]

‘But the road… I walked it once and I was terrified . Because it’s sort of a windy road . It’s narrow and you get log trucks and you get all sorts of…heavy farm equipment and there’s no place for you to get off the road . ’ [Female, Area 1]

Other road safety issues identified less frequently were similar to those seen in the urban literature, including the speed limits, visibility at night, and tourist traffic. A fifth of participants had mixed feelings about road safety “ There are some places that are really safe…there are places where like I said before you have to walk on the road” [Male, Area 2]. The remaining participants felt road safety was not an issue “ you can walk up the middle of the road , there’s very little traffic…most people walk right down the middle of the road when they go for a walk . …a lot of the places there aren’t actually footpaths , but you can walk on the road and feel safe . ” [Female, Area 2], with the majority of these participants being from the more populace coastal area (Area 1), or living in or close to the main township in their area, suggesting that town size and proximity to town centres may be an important consideration.

Three-quarters of the participants who indicated that road safety was an issue in their area also indicated that road safety impacted on their physical activity. Some participants felt that road safety did not impact on their physical activity directly, but impacted on where or how they undertook their physical activity “ That depends where I go” [Male, Area 2]; “ No…it’s how and when I do it ” [Female, Area 2].

Personal safety.

Unlike studies of urban populations, personal safety relating to crime and violence was not considered an issue for the overwhelming majority of participants “ You see the Police around a lot , so they’re a very sort of physical presence there … you just know that they’re around … it’s not a town that feels unsafe ” [Female, Area 1]. The 2 participants reporting that it was an issue both lived in a rural township (Area 1) and both had concerns related to alcohol. One also had security concerns related to the running of his business.

Similar to observations in urban samples, many participants (12 participants) indicated that there was no street lighting in their area (across all three areas), with about a third mentioning that there was adequate street lighting in their nearest township. Some participants felt that poor lighting impacted on their physical activity participation “ Lighting is a big thing for me where I live because you just can’t go anywhere after dark” [Female, Area 2], but for others, this was considered a positive aspect of living in a rural area “ I like the fact that there aren’t that many street lights because we get really good stars at night” [Female, Area 3]. Others felt that to have lighting in their area was an unrealistic expectation “ there aren’t enough houses up there to do that , to warrant the cost ” [Female, Area 3].

A number of other uniquely rural safety issues were raised, including injury risks related to uneven surfaces in paddocks or on tracks (8 participants; least common in Area 1; 17% of comments vs. 43% and 40% in Areas 2 and 3), a fear of snakes in summer (7 participants; most common in Area 2; 43% of comments vs. 17% and 20% in Areas 1 and 3, respectively), and concerns about strangers loitering in remote areas (4 participants, all from Area 1). Six participants (all female) commented that they would always carry a mobile phone with them when walking because of their isolation.

…if I have to walk across a paddock and it’s wet and it’s windy or something , if a branch fell on me or if I slipped in the wet mud and fell over and did my leg or something , then I’d carry the phone as a backup communication [Female, Area 3].

More than half of participants indicated that issues relating to personal safety did not impact on their physical activity, but of those that did, all were female. Personal safety related to knowing other people in the community appeared to impact on physical activity for a small number of participants, both in positive “ Most people know people so you feel safe out walking” [Female, Area 2] and negative “… with walking in the town I wouldn’t feel overly safe . I don’t know anyone in the community to sort of make sure that you know it’s all OK …” [Female, Area 2] ways.

Functional characteristics.

Although a number of functional characteristics were mentioned by participants, including connectivity of streets, shops and services, and public transport, the most commonly discussed features were footpaths, tracks and roads, and lighting.

Eleven participants indicated that their neighbourhood had footpaths, and that they were satisfied with these. All of these participants except one were from the more populated coastal area (Area 1) where a new walking/cycling track had recently been built; a number mentioned this new track and had favourable attitudes towards it “… they’ve built a lovely walk along the beachfront…nicely removed from the edge of the road and wide enough…groups could pass each other ” [Male, Area 1]. About half (n = 22) of the participants indicated that footpaths were present in their area, but there were barriers to their use (least common in Area 1; 44% of comments vs. 88% and 100% in Areas 2 and 3, respectively). For instance, 13 participants indicated that footpaths were only present in the central part or main street of their closest town, nine commented on issues related to continuity or path length, and six felt that the surfaces of the footpaths were poor. A small number of participants also commented on footpath accessibility issues in their area for residents with prams (strollers/pushchairs) or those with mobility impairments who needed to use a wheelchair/motorised scooter.

While for some people walking or cycling on the road where paths or tracks were not available was an option, for many it was not.

The edges , like a lot of those sorts of road , the edges are gravel and they tend to be a bit sloped , so you lose your footing and they’re not good for bikes…And also there’s electric fences so you don’t want to get too close to the edge [Female, Area 1]

Some participants expressed that the presence, absence or condition of footpaths impacted on their physical activity.

… having access to that track is really important . If it wasn’t there you’d be walking through thick bush and steep hills and it wouldn’t be as enticing [Male, Area 1]

… I would probably walk with the children to the sports centre more if there was a really good footpath . [Female, Area 3]

… if there were footpaths I’m sure I would , or room for pedestrians then I’m sure I would exercise more . [Female, Area 1]

For others however, the presence, absence or condition of footpaths appeared to have limited impact on their physical activity.

The inland part doesn’t have a footpath , but that doesn’t stop me from walking there with the dog and so on [Female, Area 1]

There’s not…a lot of the places there aren’t actually footpaths , but you can walk on the road and feel safe . [Female, Area 2]

Availability and accessibility.

All participants were able to identify places to be active in their community, including sports/recreational facilities (n = 41), parks/ovals (n = 28), natural amenities (eg, beaches, rivers, national parks; n = 28; most common in Area 1: 68% vs. 43% and 18% in Areas 2 and 3 respectively), and walking or cycling tracks (n = 20; most common in Area 1: 60% vs. 21% and 18% in Areas 2 and 3 respectively). Despite the availability of places to be active, many participants indicated they were not accessible or did not fit with their activity preferences.

Oh there’s a(n) Aquatic Centre…but that’s only open in the summer months , because it’s an open pool , it’s not closed in . [Male, Area 1]

… the local town has got a cricket oval , and that’s about it . And I’m not a cricketer [Male, Area 2]

‘ There’s a football club but I don’t play football .’ [Male, Area 1]

There’s the golf course , if you’re into golf , which I’m not [Female, Area 2]

Irrespective of area or gender, a large proportion of participants (81%) felt that having places to be active impacted on their physical activity. Those perceiving more places to be active generally believed that this impacted positively on their physical activity, while those perceiving fewer places to be active commonly felt that this negatively impacted on their physical activity.

Destinations.

While around 20% of participants indicated that there were no destinations that they could walk or ride to from their home, the remainder felt that there was at least one destination within walking or cycling distance from their home. While destinations commonly highlighted in the urban literature were mentioned (eg, shops, schools, cafes), other destinations more commonly associated with rural life included bushwalking trails, nearby townships and beaches. Despite many of the participants identifying at least one destination, more than half highlighted barriers to walking or cycling to these destinations (no differences across the three areas), such as the terrain, the long distances to reach the destination, road safety concerns, lack of time and the time of year (ie, season).

Of those who indicated that it was relatively easy to walk or cycle to destinations, approximately half agreed that this impacted on their physical activity (n = 11) while the other half felt that it did not (n = 8). In contrast, of those who indicated it was difficult to walk or cycle to destinations (n = 16), the large majority felt that this impacted on their physical activity levels (n = 13).

… if the bike track went past our house I’m sure we’d use it all the time . But it’s just that you’ve got to load the bikes in the car and pack it all up and go . [Male, Area 1]

I think if there were shops closer , yes we would walk . [Female, Area 3]

Aesthetics.

There was little variation in perceptions of the aesthetic qualities of the physical environment. Although two participants felt that their environment was not aesthetically pleasing (eg, “ I’m bored with it . It doesn’t change and it’s every day” [Male, Area 1] and eight had mixed feelings eg, “… if you talk about [township] , oh it’s a bit of a hole … where if you talk about the farm , it’s beautiful ” [Male, Area 3], the overwhelming majority of participants felt that their local environment was aesthetically pleasing.

As you hit [township] , it becomes lush . Green , trees , you know . And it’s magical . It’s just phenomenal . And the changing of the seasons , all the flowering trees , the flowering plums and the plum trees , the cherry trees . And the hawks and the crows . [Male, Area 3]

Although two thirds of participants agreed that aesthetics influenced their physical activity levels eg, “ It calls you out to go and visit” [Female, Area 2], approximately one quarter of participants felt that aesthetics did not “ But no , it wouldn’t make any difference , I don’t think ’ [Male, Area 1] and a small number had mixed feelings eg, “ Ah , that’s a bit of a combination isn’t it ? I mean it’s nice to be out in a lovely setting , but at the end of the day I think you’ve got to have a health consciousness really , to be there mentally , and to value it” . [Male, Area 1].

The aim of this study was explore the salience to rural adults of physical environmental constructs commonly used to measure physical activity in urban populations. The findings suggest that while some urban constructs are appropriate and relevant, many require reconsideration and modification to ensure relevance to rural populations. As observed among urban populations, availability and accessibility to places to be active (eg, recreational facilities) and functional characteristics such as footpaths were important considerations. However, the constructs of personal safety related to crime, the availability of walkable destinations (eg, shops, schools, parks) and aesthetics had limited influence on the physical activity of rural adults in this study. Issues related to road safety were important but operationalized differently to urban populations, further highlighting the need for modification of measures used in this population group. These differences have implications for the measurement of built and social environments in rural populations which are summarised with suggested modifications in Table 3 .

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0140659.t003

Road safety concerns were most strongly related to large trucks and winding roads with narrow or no shoulders, rather than high traffic density (ie, heavy or light), which has previously been negatively associated with physical activity [ 29 ]. A plausible explanation for this difference in findings is that the rural areas included in the previous review were predominantly North American; the rural areas included in this Australian study may have been less likely to be main thoroughfares between urban and rural locations. Road safety may be under-appreciated in rural areas because of the general assumption that roads carry less traffic. However, it is likely to be the case (as identified by some participants) that traffic along these roads travels at high speeds and in many cases comprises heavy vehicles. The narrowness of the roads and lack of a separate walking or cycling path increases the risk to pedestrians and cyclists. In rural areas where such conditions exist, it is unlikely that people will engage in active transport to destinations or engage in recreational exercise along these routes if it means risking their safety.

As observed in urban samples, the importance of functional characteristics (such as footpaths) was a relevant construct for rural residents. Interestingly, only four out of nine studies included in a review of the built environment in rural settings found positive associations between sidewalks or shoulders and physical activity [ 29 ]. The findings from the current study highlight the importance of assessing factors that hinder footpath usage in rural areas, such as continuity, length and poor surfaces, and strongly relate to the issues of road safety, described above. Availability and accessibility of places to be active (eg, recreational facilities) was also a relevant construct, with the rural adults in this study identifying numerous places to be active were available. However, as seen in studies of urban adults, accessibility was an issue for many (eg, opening hours, winter closures), as was a lack of facilities relevant to personal interests.

Although positive associations between low crime and physical activity have been observed in rural studies [ 29 ], in the current study there was a lack of concern about personal safety related to crime, which had little impact on physical activity. This may be related to Tasmania’s crime rates which are generally lower than the national average in Australia [ 30 ]. However, personal safety issues related to uneven surfaces on tracks and in paddocks and environmental hazards (eg, falling branches, snakes) were evident, particularly among women, and require specific consideration in rural samples.

While some participants mentioned destinations commonly described in the urban literature (eg, services, schools, shops) as being within walking/cycling distance, more common destinations included bushwalking trails, nearby townships, or beaches/rivers, which should be included in future studies examining this construct. Also important to assess are the barriers to using active forms of transport to get to these destinations, such as terrain, long distances, road safety concerns, and the impact of poor weather. Mixed findings have been observed in studies examining associations between ‘walkable destinations’ and physical activity [ 29 ]. These mixed findings may be due to a lack of consideration of destinations that are relevant to rural residents, such as those described in the current study (eg, bushwalking trails, nearby townships, beaches/rivers), which should be given attention in future studies of rural residents.

Nearly all participants in the current study felt that their area was aesthetically pleasing. Despite this, most felt that the aesthetic appeal of their area did not result in increases in physical activity. This is in contrast to the findings from other rural (quantitative) studies [ 29 ] which have consistently identified positive relationships between aesthetics and different types of physical activity, including total physical activity [ 16 , 31 ], walking [ 32 ], and leisure-time activity [ 23 ]. This finding is difficult to interpret in this study because of the lack of heterogeneity in responses, so it is not clear whether those in a less attractive rural setting would do less or more physical activity. The impact of aesthetics on levels of physical activity amongst rural residents requires further exploration.

A number of differences in the key themes were noted according to area. For example, road safety was not considered an issue in Area 1 but was in Areas 2 and 3; personal safety, including ‘hoons’ and strangers, were only of concern for residents in Area 1 while footing was less of a concern in Area 1; and compared to Areas 2 and 3, those living in Area 1 were more commonly satisfied with the footpaths in their area, and more commonly reported access to the natural environment and to cycling and walking tracks. These differences may attributable to differences in the ‘rurality’ and/or profiles of areas. For example, the population density of Area 1 was much higher (78.3/km 2 ) than of Areas 2 (2.9/km 2 ) and 3 (0.4/ km 2 ), Area 1 is further from the Tasmanian capital city, Hobart (312.9km), than Areas 2 (79.5km) and 3 (58.5km), and Area 1 is less disadvantaged (Index of Relative Socioeconomic Advantage and Disadvantage, IRSAD 914.4) than Areas 2 (IRSAD 865.8) and 3 (IRSAD 885.9). Of interest in terms of transferability of these findings to other countries, the population density of Area 1 is similar to that seen in rural areas of Europe (mean: 63/km 2 ) [ 33 ] and the United States of America (USA) (mean: 65/km 2 ) [ 34 ].

Limited qualitative research has examined environmental influences on physical activity among rural adults. However, some similarities and differences have been noted in other studies. One focus group study of 19 adults in a rural Midwestern county in the USA identified accessibility, destinations and sidewalks as important influences on physical activity in rural adults [ 35 ], which is similar to the findings for accessibility and footpaths, but not destinations (which did not seem impact on physical activity), described in the current study. A qualitative study of senior citizens in Oklahoma, USA, identified lack of indoor physical activity opportunities as a major barrier to physical activity, which did not emerge as a theme in the current study, possibly due to more extreme climatic conditions in Oklahoma compared to Tasmania [ 36 ].

This study had some limitations. It was limited to one state of Australia, but did include three distinct regions representing diverse land uses (eg, animal-based farming, plant-based farming, and forestry), landscapes (eg, inland, coastal, forest), and population densities. There may have been other environmental features of more concern to rural residents that were not explored; participants were provided with the opportunity to raise any other issues, but no other relevant issues were raised. The sample varied from the general population on some characteristics (education levels were higher, marriage was more common and fewer women were classified overweight or obese in this study), but were very similar in other areas (median age, proportion Australian-born, proportion of men classified as overweight or obese). Because of the cross-sectional nature of the study, it is possible that more active participants had greater awareness of their environment because of greater exposure; that is, people who are more commonly utilising places to be active may be more aware of what is available. Both a possible limitation and strength is that we did not focus on specific types or domains of physical activity (e.g. leisure, transport, walking) in relation to the environmental constructs explored, as this was an exploratory study: this lack of specificity may have diluted responses, or potentially strengthened the findings by allowing participants to describe physical activity through their own interpretation and experience.

Key strengths include this being the first study to use a qualitative approach to understand the salience to rural adults of commonly used constructs of the built and social environment, and how the built and social environment influences physical activity among rural adults. Definitions of rurality also vary internationally, but this study allows insights into the impact of the local environment on rural residents’ physical activity behaviour. As with much research related to environments and health, some of the results may be specific to the context explored and therefore we advocate for further work across and Australia and internationally to help confirm key factors most salient for rural populations.

Despite some limitations, the findings of this study have implications for research, practice and policy. Researchers examining the effects of the built and social environment in rural areas could consider modifying instruments, and testing the validity of these modifications in larger more representative samples using quantitative techniques, to ensure that the environmental factors acting as barriers or facilitators to physical activity among rural residents are thoroughly captured. If these findings are confirmed in larger, quantitative studies, there are possible implications for policy and practice, such as local councils considering safety audits of the main travel routes in and around their town and assess if separate paths are required to ensure safe travel, and ensuring that existing paths are well-maintained and provide linkages with commonly-accessed destinations or facilities. Again, if findings are confirmed through quantitative research, local councils, service providers and recreational facilities could work towards tailoring their physical activity programs to suit local needs, and towards ensuring that facilities are available at suitable times of the day and throughout the year.

In conclusion, this study, which aimed to explore the salience of urban physical activity environment constructs among rural adults, has identified a number of areas where current instruments could be improved upon to better reflect the nature of rural life. Although not conclusive due to the qualitative and cross-sectional nature of this study, consideration of these factors in future research and practice is warranted.

Supporting Information

S1 file. interview transcripts 1–10..

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0140659.s001

S2 File. Interview transcripts 11–20.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0140659.s002

S3 File. Interview transcripts 21–30.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0140659.s003

S4 File. Interview transcripts 31–40.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0140659.s004

S5 File. Interview transcripts 41–49.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0140659.s005

Acknowledgments

We would like to gratefully acknowledge the work of Christine Caleidin, who coordinated and conducted the majority of interviews.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: VC CH LT AV KB. Performed the experiments: VC. Analyzed the data: VC CH KS. Wrote the paper: VC CH LT KS AV KB.

• 1. Australian Institute of Health & Welfare. Cardiovascular disease: Australian facts 2011. Canberra: AIHW, 2011.
• 2. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Deaths: Preliminary Data for 2011. Services UDoHaH; 2012.
• 3. World Health Organization. Global health risks: mortality and burden of disease attributable to selected major risks. Geneva: World Health Organization, 2009.
• View Article
• PubMed/NCBI
• Google Scholar
• 5. Australian Institute of Health & Welfare. Rural, regional & remote health: indicators of health status & determinants of health. Canberra: AIHW, 2008 Contract No.: Cat. no. PHE 97.
• 13. Sallis J, Owen N. Ecological models of health behavior. In: Glanz K, Rimer BK, Lewis FM, editors. Health Behavior and Health Education: Theory, Research & Practice. 3rd Edition. San Francisco, USA: Jossey-Bass; 2002. p. 462–84.
• 14. Bauman A, Bull FC. Environmental correlates of physical activity and walking in adults and children: A review of reviews. National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellence, 2007.
• 27. Australian Bureau of Statistics. Australian Statistical Geography Standard (ASGS): Volume 5—Remoteness Structure. Canberra: ABS, 2011.
• 30. Australian Bureau of Statistics. Crime and Safety, Australia. Canberra: ABS, 2006.
• 33. Eurostat. Demography statistics by urban-rural typology (urt_demo): Population density (urt_d3dens) 2012 [19th December 2014]. Available: http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/en/web/main/data/database?node_code=urt_d3dens .
• 34. United States Census Bureau. 2010 Census Urban and Rural Classification and Urban Area Criteria 2010 [19th December 2014]. Available: https://www.census.gov/geo/reference/ua/urban-rural-2010.html .

Research Environment

• Open Access
• First Online: 28 March 2023

Cite this chapter

You have full access to this open access chapter

• Lana Barać   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-0170-5972 3  

Part of the book series: Collaborative Bioethics ((CB,volume 1))

5383 Accesses

Successful research environment requires joint effort by individual researchers, research groups and the organization. This chapter describes the basic principles and good research practices in the context of the research environment and serves as a guide to good, responsible research for research newcomers – researchers at the beginning of their scientific career. In this chapter we will help you navigate the organizational pathway to doing good research. The first step to understanding your rights, obligations and responsibilities in research is knowing that they exist. This chapter offers an introductory level orientation to codes, rules and regulations but also serves as a guide on how to identify whether your organization goes above and beyond offering guidance and assistance regarding research integrity or whether it provides a bare minimum or even nothing at all, and who/what you can turn to in the latter case. Furthermore, this chapter also describes the responsibilities that you as a researcher have towards the organisation regarding the importance of maintaining research integrity, so that you are aware of your accountability and the possible consequences if you disregard organizational responsibility for responsible research.

You have full access to this open access chapter,  Download chapter PDF

Similar content being viewed by others

Research Integrity: Responsible Conduct of Research

Research Integrity and Hidden Value Conflicts

Research Assessments Should Recognize Responsible Research Practices. Narrative Review of a Lively Debate and Promising Developments

• Research climate
• Research culture
• Research ethics structures
• Research integrity structures

What This Chapter Is About

Successful research environment requires joint effort by individual researchers, research groups and the organization. This chapter describes the basic principles and good research practices in the context of research environment and serves as a guide to good, responsible research for research newcomers – researchers at the beginning of their scientific career. In this chapter we will help you navigate the organizational pathway to doing good research. The first step to understanding your rights, obligations and responsibilities in research is knowing that they exist. This chapter offers an introductory level orientation to codes, rules and regulations but also serves as a guide on how to identify whether your organization goes above and beyond offering guidance and assistance regarding research integrity or whether it provides a bare minimum or even nothing at all, and who/what you can turn to in the latter case. Furthermore, this chapter also describes the responsibilities that you as a researcher have towards the organisation regarding the importance of maintaining research integrity, so that you are aware of your accountability and the possible consequences if you disregard organizational responsibility for responsible research.

Case Scenario: Research Environment and Research Integrity

This hypothetical scenario was adapted from a narrative concerning the links between research environments and research integrity. The case scenario was developed by the Members of The Embassy of Good Science and is available at the Embassy of Good Science . The case below is published under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike license, version 4.0 (CC BY-SA 4.0).

After 6 months of working as a novice researcher in a research lab at a university school, you meet up with a colleague who graduated with you and is now working as a novice researcher in a commercial research organization. She tells you that she may have encountered a potential research misconduct concerning intellectual property. She knew what she had to do because the company is very committed to making sure all employees are fully informed about all existing rules and regulations. Her action prevented the misconduct. That conversation made you think that you were never been briefed or informed in detail about rules and regulations regarding research when you signed your employment contract with your organization. You heard your mentor casually mention “standard rules of conduct in research,” expecting you to know what they are. The day after your meeting with your colleague, you check your school’s webpages for information on research integrity. Although there is no explicit mention of research integrity, your University’s website refers to its own code of conduct as well as the European Code of Conduct for Research Integrity. Furthermore, a university-wide academic integrity complaints procedure and a research integrity committee are mentioned but details of which, however, cannot be found on the university’s public webpages. After talking to your fellow novice researchers, you realize that they too are uncertain about whether your school has written guidelines for research integrity. You also realize that they feel pressurized to generate more and more research outputs and that insecurity, linked to short-term contracts and scarce opportunities for professional advancement, means that they perceive the incentives to succeed in research and academia as outweighing the incentives to comply with the norms of good research practices. They not only feel that your school does not adequately promote research integrity but that that pressure comes within the organization, also as a result of the culture of “ publish or perish ” After talking to them you realise that there is more to this problem than just ignorance or integrity issues with individual novice researchers and that their views could indicate an environmental problem in academia.

Questions for You

In light of this case scenario, what do you think which person(s) or groups should be responsible for the early-career researchers’ general lack of knowledge concerning the university’s research integrity guidelines, codes of conduct and complaints procedures? What are the reasons for your answer?

In what ways could a research organization make its research integrity standards, guidelines and processes more visible to its researchers, especially early-career researchers? What initiatives should be promoted in a research organization in order to engage early-career researchers with research integrity standards, guidelines and processes?

Thinking about the ways in which your organization currently engages early-career researchers with research integrity standards, guidelines and processes, what could be done to improve such engagement at the level of your organization and the level of your department or laboratory?

The Responsibilities of the Organization: Above and Beyond, or the Bare Minimum?

Good research practice from the european code of conduct for research integrity:.

Research institutions and organisations promote awareness and ensure a prevailing culture of research integrity .

When starting at a new job in a new research organization you have to understand that an organization is a living organism – a system with organized structure that functions as an individual entity and is, as all organisms are, prone to constant change. One change that has been having a huge momentum in Europe in recent years is the initiative to encourage activities that show commitment of organizations to make research integrity (RI) and responsible research in general as a top priority. Empowering sound and verifiable research and fostering a research integrity culture, thus creating a proper research environment, is now empowered by embedding these principles as requirements in EU funding schemes. As research environment is a dimension that needs to be considered by all involved stakeholders, activities conducted in order to foster good research practices and a culture of research integrity will impact researchers at all levels.

When we talk about organization as a system, the terms organizational climate and organizational culture are sometimes used interchangeably or considered as complementary constructs. The two terms are different. Organizational climate is usually defined as shared perceptions of policies, practices and procedures experienced by the employees, as well as the behaviours the employees perceive as rewarding. It is considered to be the measurable manifestation of organizational culture , which is defined as the system of basic assumptions, deep values and beliefs that are prevalent in the organization. Organizational culture is something that has to be built, maintained and nurtured by supportive environment.

As a part of organizational culture, research integrity has become an integral part of a university’s mission, vision and strategy. For example; universities in France will, in the near future, in what seems to be the first national initiative of its kind, go as far as requiring Ph.D. recipients to take an integrity oath on the day they successfully defend their thesis. Research integrity is also dependent on human factors – collegiality, openness, reflection, shared responsibility and work satisfaction are vital elements of a successful working environment. As a novice researcher, you should try, from the very beginning of your career, to comply with the highest standards of ethics and integrity in the performance of your research.

How can you figure out the ethical landscape at the very start of your career? The first step to understanding your rights, obligations and responsibilities is knowing that they exist .

Rules, codes and regulations can be created by the organization itself but also by national or international bodies. They can have different names and vary in scope, but they are always a written set of instructions issued by an organization. Depending on the scope of action, codes can cover issues prescribed by legal regulations such as: human subject’s protection, animal care, intellectual property and confidentiality, legality and mechanisms to identify and procedure for reporting and dealing with research misconduct. Other than binding legal issues, codes can also cover fundamental principles of research which serve organisations in creating and preserving an environment for responsible research. Fundamental principles presented by the most widely recognized and accepted documents – European Code of Conduct for Research Integrity (All European Academies 2017) and Fostering Integrity in Research (US National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine 2017), might not be identical in the naming of the principles but the meaning of the principles in RI perspective is similar (Table 1.1 ).

Not all research or academic organizations are as big or as well developed to have the resources to promptly and adequately inform you about all rules and obligations regarding research. That does not mean you are not required to follow them or that your rights are not protected by them. Organizational guides and codes should be easily accessible on the organization’s webpages and/or intranet. You should be provided with adequate training, tailored to the research discipline and the type of organization, and briefed about standard rules of conduct in research. Bear in mind that the organizational support structure is usually proportional to the size and complexity of the organization. Apart from having binding documents about responsible research, your organization should have established channels to facilitate an open dialogue at and between all levels; from management and senior researchers to novice researchers and other members of staff. Ideally, your organization should, apart from the standard rules and regulations, develop and implement a research integrity promotion plan (RIPP). This is a document that describes, on a general level, how the organization promotes research integrity and which concrete methods are employed or are being developed to foster research integrity and to deal with allegations of breaches of research integrity. Procedures to increase transparency of research investigation procedure and safe and effective whistle-blowing channels and the protection of alleged perpetrators should also be implemented in line with the legal principle of the presumption of innocence – someone accused of research misconduct is considered innocent until proven guilty.

When navigating the research environment, it is always advisable to consider the human factor. Some organizations are very organized. Some are not. Even though an organization may be committed to following the prescribed rules, do not expect to be given a clear and user-friendly version of these rules upon arrival. Some organizations have rules and regulations because they had to comply with national or international regulations. Other organizations have them because the management is devoted to actively promoting responsible research. Some organizations are understaffed, so the lack of organizational documents may not necessarily reflect the moral of the organization. In brief, even if your organization does not have instructions for the new employees written on a (virtual) bulletin board, that does not mean that they do not exist, so no matter whether you were briefed or not these rules apply to you and you should be governed by those rules.

Here is some advice for you on how to navigate responsible research environment in your organization:

Always get familiar with existing laws, codes and regulations in the organization and country where you work. If you are a member of a professional organization or if you are professionally bound to the code of ethics of your profession, check whether the professional code is aligned with that of your organisation. Some organizations may provide a checklist with sources and links to different guidelines and rules of procedure for good research practice available online. Do not forget to get familiar with international principles and EU standards such as The European Code of Conduct for Research Integrity , principles prescribed for different professions (e.g., The Declaration of Helsinki or Convention on Biological Diversity ) and national guidelines, but first and foremost to the documents and guidance provided by your organization.

Consider that different views of research ethics around the world reflect differences in culture and legal frameworks, which can lead to differences in regulations. For example, the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) has a very expansive definition of personal information that may warrant protection, whereas in the United States (US), there is a narrower (and often domain-specific) characterization of privacy-sensitive information. Even within the EU, there are differences among EU member countries – the examples are different laws on stem-cell research and human embryos. Differences in regulations unfortunately may lead to ethics dumping – the practice of researchers trained in cultures with rigorous ethical standards to go and conduct research in countries with laxer ethical rules and oversight, in order to circumvent the regulations, policies, or processes that exist in their home countries.

Keep in mind that codes and regulations change and can evolve. For example, The Nuremberg Code; which is a set of research ethics principles for human experimentation was created by the US vs. Brandt et al. court case, as a result of the Nuremberg trials at the end of the World War 2. The core elements of the Nuremberg Code are the requirements for voluntary and informed consent, a favourable risk/benefit analysis, and the right to withdraw from a study without consequences. That standard was confirmed in 1964, when the WMA’s Declaration of Helsinki was endorsed and again specified that experiments involving human beings needed the informed consent of participants. The Declaration of Helsinki has been updated overe the years, so make sure that you consult its latest version. Another example is the infamous Tuskegee syphilis study , funded by the US Public Health Service. The study was conducted between 1932 and 1972 at Tuskegee Institute in Alabama to evaluate the natural history of untreated syphilis in African American males. The study was conducted for 40 years without ethical review and denied participants the effective treatment for this curable disease. The study became a milestone in the history of US research regulations, as it was conducted without ethical re-evaluation in spite of both The Nuremberg Code and the Declaration of Helsinki being accepted and established as a standard during the study. The aftermath of the public disclosure of the Tuskegee study led to the establishment of the National Commission for the Protection of Human Subjects of Biomedical and Behavioural Research and the National Research Act that requires the establishment of institutional review boards (IRBs) at institutions receiving federal support.

Codes and regulations can also change due to scientific advancements that lead to new fields of research (e.g., the emergence of experimental psychology) or new technologies (e.g., gene editing, artificial intelligence). The changes can also come in response to changes in cultural values and behavioural norms that evolve over time (e.g., perceptions of privacy and confidentiality).

Consider emerging ethics topics , even if they are not listed or mentioned in current codes of your organization, such as bystander risk (impacts of research on other people; e.g. genetic testing and genetic research, second-hand exposure to a contagious disease) big data and open science (concerns about the potential to compromise privacy), and citizen science (involving community participation in science, allowing the research population to become researchers).

Research institutions and organisations demonstrate leadership in providing clear policies and procedures on good research practice and the transparent and proper handling of violations.

Knowing, understanding and using existing codes and regulations for good research is important and useful, but there may be times when you are in doubt about how what is written in a code translates into real life. Therefore, it is important to learn how to interpret, assess, and apply different research rules and how to make decisions to act ethically and responsibly in different situations or at least know who to turn to when in doubt . To put it simply: pure existence of the codes does not make an ethical environment. Or, in words of Aristotle: “One swallow does not a summer make.”

If codes, rules and regulations are the foundation of research integrity culture, building strong pillars to rest upon, establishing research ethics structures is the next crucial step for organizations to ensure proper research environment.

Different organizations may have different supportive mechanisms to ensure that researchers adhere to research ethics and integrity requirements. Depending on the size and the type of the organization, key organizational bodies and staff dealing with research ethics and integrity might quite vary in name and scope of work. It is important to understand that, depending on type of research organisation, you may encounter organisational bodies (or individuals) with various scope of activities regarding research ethics and integrity. This may seem confusing at first, as the concepts of ethics and integrity may seem intertwined and actually, for the most part, they are. Research ethics (RE) is the term that encompassed fundamental moral principles and research integrity (RI) is the quality of having moral principles, defined as active adherence to the ethical principles and professional standards essential for the responsible practice of research. Both of them are a necessary part of responsible conduct of research.

Ideally, your organisation will have all necessary structures, processes, and dedicated and adequately trained staff to uphold best research practices and standards, and deal with procedures relevant to the various research areas and disciplines within the organisation. Listed below are some of the common research ethics and integrity bodies (names might vary). If there is only one of these at your organisation, the scope of their responsibilities is probably wider and you can still contact them regarding any doubt and insecurity you might have about responsible research.

Ethics Committee or Institutional Review Board is probably the most common body at academic and research organizations, because it has the longest history. Research Ethics Committees were developed after the World War 2, particularly in response to The Nuremberg Trials, as bodies responsible for oversight of medical or human research studies. The role of an Ethics Committee is to scrutinise research proposals and ensure that the proposed research adequately addressed all relevant ethics issues. This means that they make sure that proposed research protocols protect rights, safety, dignity and well-being of participants, that research protocols involving animals follow the highest animal care standards and that they facilitate and promote ethical research that is of potential benefit to participants, science and society. In smaller organisations that do not necessarily have other bodies, the role of the Ethics Committee would also be to facilitate and promote research integrity and good research practices, to have mechanisms to identify and procedure for reporting and dealing with allegations of breaches of research integrity (research misconduct).

Board/Office/ Commission for Research Integrity is a body that promotes responsible research conduct, serves as a knowledge base for questions regarding research integrity and research misconduct, informs on policies and procedures in and outside of the organization, handles allegations of research misconduct and conducts investigations, advises on administrative action and also responds to allegations of retaliation against whistle-blowers. It is responsible for providing advice for researchers on how to adhere to responsible research practices, usually through guidelines, checklists and other documents in which good research practices are presented. The organisational structures of RI committees and their responsibilities regarding cases of research misconduct may vary depending on the organisational or national regulations. For example, the Office for Research Integrity in the US is a governmental body that has monitoring and oversight role to ensure that researchers and organisations which receive federal funding for health research comply with existing regulations; it offers support to further good practice research and promote integrity and high ethical standards, as well as to have robust and fair methods to address poor research practices and misconduct.

Another individual position you may encounter at your organisation is the Research Integrity Officer (RIO) , a professional with a complex role. An organisation’s RIO promotes responsible research, conducts research training, discourages research misconduct, and deals with allegations of or evidence of possible research misconduct. The details of an RIO’s job vary from country to country, but the position is mandatory in many. For example, in US organisations, a RIO serves as the liaison between the federal Office for Research Integrity and the organisation of the researchers. In the EU, countries have different requirements and roles for their RIOs, but their task is essentially the same. Some countries do not have such bodies, and their role is most often taken by Ethics Committees.

Your organisation may have a Research Integrity Ombudsperson or Confidential Advisor on Scientific Integrity or Research Integrity Advisor . The aim of such an advisor is to promote fair, non-discriminatory and equitable treatment related to research integrity within the organisation and improve the overall quality of the research working environment. Such a position should be well known in the organisation, and there should be a low threshold for contacting this person. Researchers who experience research integrity dilemmas or have come into an integrity-related conflict should be able to discuss their case with the ombudsperson in a strictly confidential manner. The function of the ombudsperson should be clearly separated from a formal research integrity committee or ethics committee, so that it is clear to researchers that contacting the ombudsperson does not imply a formal registration of an allegation but a confidential and informal assistance in resolving research work-related conflicts, disputes and grievances (including, but not limited to complaints/appeals of researchers regarding conflicts between supervisor(s) and early-stage researchers).

Research institutions and organisations support proper infrastructure for the management and protection of data and research materials in all their forms (encompassing qualitative and quantitative data, protocols, processes, other research artefacts and associated metadata) that are necessary for reproducibility, traceability and accountability.

Even as an early-career researcher you probably realise that, while doing research, dealing with a fair amount of different types of data is inevitable. Ten years ago the Science journal polled their peer reviewers from the previous year on the availability and use of research data, and, about half of those polled stored their data only in their laboratories. If you had walked in any type of research organisation 10 years ago you would have had probably been briefed about keeping your lab notebook records and advised about keeping your data somewhere other than your lab desktop computer. Today, when we talk about data management, we go well beyond keeping your lab or research notebook in order. While maintaining a lab notebook is still essential for anybody performing research as a document of completed work so that research can be replicated and validated; or a legal document to prove intellectual property/invention, data management on an organisational level entails much more . It comprises the infrastructure (technology, services and staff support), training for researchers, and policies on data management (DMPs). Therefore, you should expect from your organisation to provide instructions and policies regarding data curation (repositories), management, use, access, publishing, and sharing. Regarding the technology for data management, your organisation should provide appropriate storage media that enables collecting, organizing, protecting, storing, and sharing data. It should also inform you about available data repositories, networks and different authentication systems. Research organisations should make DMPs easily accessible and organisations’ websites should provide extensive information about the concept of data sharing in general, as well as detailed information on DMP requirements and how to comply with them. Services and staff support for data management are highly dependent on the amount of funding and size of an organisation because the amount of work and time involved in these processes is extensive and costly. Some organisations have whole departments and others at best a single person for data management.

In 2019, Science Europe released its Practical Guide to the International Alignment of Research Data Management , and, as a follow-up, compiled the document to showcase some best practices. The document also demonstrated the variability of data management processes in different organisations. Although the readiness to develop DMPs can differ according to discipline, most research funders require researchers to include a DMP in their project proposals. You should expect from your organisation to have in place the structures and procedures to facilitate data management and curation procedures that are aligned with FAIR principles, which say that data should be F indable, A ccessible, I nteroperable, and R eusable. Bear in mind that researchers’ knowledge about research data management could be limited in countries and organisations where open science policies are not well developed. This leads to misunderstandings about the need to store and archive data. For detailed guidance on data practices and management throughout the lifecycle of research data and instructions to preparation of data management plans (DMPs) see Chap. 5 .

Research institutions and organisations reward open and reproducible practices in hiring and promotion of researchers.

No matter whether you have been in research for some time or you are a novice researcher, you have probably heard the catchphrase “ publish or perish !” because it has been uttered in whisper by stressed and burned-out researchers all over the world for years, putting pressures on individual integrity and potentially fostering practices harmful to scientific research. Publish or perish culture thrives on metrics (number of articles published and impact factors of journals) but fails to adequately take societal and broader impact into account . Some aspects of research are indeed quantifiable and cannot be and will not be ignored, but recent efforts towards more inclusive evaluation scheme of research and researchers could be a “game-changer”, meaning that yes, you are still required to publish, but the scientific efforts that translate better to a broader community will not be ignored.

When it comes to hiring and promotion in research, the need for transparency should be self-explanatory, but what does promoting open practices mean in reality? Geographically speaking, Europe might be ahead of the curve in endorsing and implementing changes as the new framework programme Horizon Europe makes Open Science mandatory throughout the programme and includes Open Innovation as one of three framework pillars. What does this mean for you? Although the attitude and the level of commitment of the organisation toward endorsing open science principles could vary and very much depend on the human factor, there is no reason for you not to be aware of the change to come and strive to fulfil the general idea of quality . Producing quality science would imply producing substantive, impactful science , science that reaches broader audience and addresses valuable questions, but is also reliable enough to build upon. This mean that evaluation and appraisal procedures may assess a researcher’s contribution to addressing societal needs and publishing all research completely and transparently, regardless of whether the results were positive or negative. This would also imply implementing open research practices and embedding these skills in training of early-career researchers, making preliminary results and final results available to the general public, potential users and the research community, in order to facilitate broader assessment and accountability of research.

There are also indications that the EU is moving towards a structured CV which would include Responsible Indicators for Assessing Scientists (RIAS), and other related information. For example; the department of psychology at LMU München added a paragraph to a professorship job advertisement which asks for an open science statement from the candidates: “Our department embraces the values of open science and strives for replicable and reproducible research. For this goal we support transparent research with open data, open material, and pre-registrations. Candidates are asked to describe in what way they already pursued and plan to pursue these goals.” Another example is University of Liège , where depositing papers in the repository is now the sole mechanism for submitting them to be considered when researchers underwent performance review.

Check whether your organisation has procedures related to the publication and communication of research results, such as preregistration, preprints, and online repositories, the organisational approach to open access, FAIR data curation, expectations about the use of reporting guidelines, procedures for avoiding predatory journals, strategies for responsible peer review practices, and mechanisms to support and acknowledge public communication of research findings. Also, check whether your organisation is ahead of the curve in promoting Open Science (Fig. 1.1 ) check for procedures and practices through the organisation’s own website or other established platforms on organisational or national level, check whether your organisation has signed any declaration relevant to Open Science .

Core principles of Open Science. For details, see the FOSTER project

The Responsibilities of the Researcher

Ask not what your organisation can do for you – ask what you can do for your organisation.

While The European Code of Conduct for Research Integrity (ECoC RI) provides general guidance for good research practices and serves as a framework for self-regulation, the document that details your role, responsibilities and entitlements as a researcher is The European Charter for Researchers . The Charter is a set of general principles and requirements that addresses all researchers in the European Union at all stages of their career, covers all fields of research and takes into account the multiple roles that researchers can have.

Being a researcher is highly related to context and not defined only by job positions, formal qualifications level of education or by seniority at work. According to The Frascati definition ; Researchers are professionals engaged in the conception or creation of new knowledge . They conduct research and improve or develop concepts, theories, models, techniques instrumentation, software or operational methods. The tasks performed depend on job characteristics and personal strengths but have to be related to research and innovation. Activities of a researcher are many, but first and foremost entail: conducting and evaluating research and innovation, applying for research funding, managing projects and teams, managing, sharing and transferring the generated knowledge (including through scholarly communication, science communication to society, knowledge management for policy, and knowledge transfer to industry) and higher education teaching.

As an early-career researcher, you should keep in mind that everything you do reflects upon your organisation . So be sure to comply with the highest values and ethical standards and aim at excellence. Even as a novice researcher, at a beginning of your career be aware that your organisation will treat you as a responsible adult and will hold you accountable . Also, depending on the applicable rules, your organisation might be held accountable for your wrongdoing, so, even if you are there for a brief amount of time (post-doctoral or project-based position) remember that you are a part of the research environment and are expected to contribute to a positive, fair and stimulating research culture.

Science is by definition a joint endeavour and you should learn to accept responsibility because that is what being accountable entails. Accountability refers to an obligation or willingness to accept responsibility for one’s actions, meaning that, when individuals are accountable, they understand and accept the consequences of their actions for the areas in which they assume responsibility. Remember that you, as an employee, have contractual and legal obligations. That basically means that you are liable in case of breach of contract and you have to adhere to such regulations by delivering the required results (e.g. thesis, publications, patents, reports, new products development, etc), as set out in the terms and conditions of the contract or equivalent document. You should be familiar with the strategic goals, seek all necessary approvals before starting your research or accessing the resources provided. You should, at all times, keep a professional attitude . This included maintaining a professional etiquette at workplace – respectful and courteous demeanour towards colleagues and respect in the sense of responsibilities (e.g. informing your supervisor if you are not able to meet deadlines).

As a researcher, you should, first and foremost, focus your research for the good of mankind and for expanding the frontiers of scientific knowledge. You should be guaranteed the freedom of thought and expression , and the freedom to identify methods by which problems are solved, according to recognized ethical principles and practices. But, bear in mind that there is a difference between using research freedom and abusing it. You should, by all means, recognize the limitations to this freedom that could arise as a result of particular research circumstances or operational constraints (e.g. for budgetary or infrastructural reasons or, especially in the industrial sector, for reasons of intellectual property protection). Such limitations should not contravene recognized ethical principles and practices in research. When it comes to ethical principles , you should adhere to the recognized ethical practices and fundamental ethical principles appropriate to your discipline, as well as to ethical standards defined in different national, sectoral or organisational codes of ethics. It is highly recommended to conduct ethics self-assessment at the very beginning of planning your research. Ethics self-assessment helps getting your research protocol ethics-ready , as it may give rise to binding obligations that may later on be checked through ethics checks and reviews. Consider that ethics issues arise in many areas of research and, as of recently, major scientific journals require researchers to provide ethics committee approval before publishing research articles. You should also adopt safe working practices, in line with national legislation, including taking the necessary precautions by preparing proper back-up strategies.

As we mentioned before, Open Science practices should be the norm, especially when performing publicly funded research, as they improve the quality, efficiency, responsiveness of research and trust in science. You should guarantee open access to research publications and research data and foster innovation in sharing research knowledge as early as possible in the research process, through adequate infrastructures and tools. You should ensure, in compliance with your contractual arrangements, that the results of your research are disseminated and exploited. Be public and open about your research . There are, of course, legitimate reasons to restrict access to certain data sets (for instance in order to protect the privacy of research subjects) so be guided by the principle “ As open as possible, as closed as necessary” . Ensure that your research activities are made known to society at large in such a way that they can be understood by non-specialists, thereby improving public understanding of science. Direct engagement with the public will help researchers better understand public interest in priorities for science and technology and also their concerns.

You should seek to continually improve yourself by regularly updating and expanding your skills and competencies. This may be achieved by a variety of means including, but not restricted to, formal training, workshops, conferences and e-learning.

Do not be afraid to diversify your research career , as research community is diverse in talents and expertise and can produce a wide range of research outputs (from scholar publications to scientific advice for policy makers, science communication to the public, higher education teaching, knowledge transfer to industry, and many others). Explore different career paths within the research profession, so that your talent finds the best place to produce richer research results.

Author information

Authors and affiliations.

Department of Research in Biomedicine and Health, University of Split School of Medicine, Split, Croatia

You can also search for this author in PubMed   Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Lana Barać .

Editor information

Editors and affiliations.

School of Medicine, University of Split, Split, Croatia

Ana Marusic

If You Want to Learn More

The embassy of good science.

Case scenario – Research Environments and Research Integrity

Guidelines – Creating a map of the normative framework informing and governing the state of Good Science

Education – Literature and tools in research integrity and ethics

Published Articles

Ashkanasy N, Wilderom C, Peterson M (2011) The handbook of organizational culture and climate. Sage Publications, New York

Fischer BA (2006) A summary of important documents in the field of research ethics. Schizophr Bull 32(1):69–80. https://doi.org/10.1093/schbul/sbj005

Moher D, Naudet F, Cristea IA, Miedema F, Ioannidis JPA, Goodman SN (2018) Assessing scientists for hiring, promotion, and tenure. PLoS Biol 16(3):e2004089. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.2004089

Qiao H (2018) A brief introduction to institutional review boards in the United States. Pediatr Investig 2(1):46–51. https://doi.org/10.1002/ped4.12023

Qin J (2013) Infrastructure, standards, and policies for research data management. In: Sharing of scientific and technical resources in the era of big data: the proceedings of COINFO 2013. Science Press, Beijing, pp 214–219

Schneider B, Ehrhart MG, Macey WH (2013) Organizational climate and culture. Ann Rev Psychol 64(1):361–388. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-psych-113011-143809

Ščepanović R, Labib K, Buljan I, Tijdink J, Marušić A (2021) Practices for research integrity promotion in research performing organisations and research funding organisations: a scoping review. Sci Eng Ethics 27(1):4. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11948-021-00281-1

Science Staff (2011) Special collection. Dealing with data. Challenges and opportunities. Science 331:692–693. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.331.6018.692

National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM). (2017). Fostering integrity in research. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. http://nap.nationalacademies.org/21896

Zohar DM, Hofmann DA (2012) Organizational culture and climate. In: Kozlowski SWJ (ed) The Oxford handbook of organizational psychology, vol 1. Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp 643–666

The European Code of Conduct for Research Integrity - framework for self-regulation across all scientific and scholarly disciplines and for all research settings. ECoC is a reference document for research integrity for all EU-funded research projects and as a model for organisations and researchers across Europe. All European Academies (ALLEA). (2017). https://allea.org/code-of-conduct/

The Bonn PRINTEGER Statement – Working with research integrity; guidance for research performing organisations

SOPs4RI Toolbox – Standard Operating Procedures and Guidelines that Research Performing and Funding Organisations can use to develop their own Research Integrity Promotion Plans

LERU – The League of European Research Universities (LERU) is a prominent advocate for the promotion of basic research at European research universities comprising of League of European Research Universities 23 leading universities pushing the frontiers of innovative research

Science Europe – Implementing Research Data Management Policies Across Europe: Experiences from Science Europe Member Organisations

Ask Open Science – Hosted by Bielefeld University, discussion (Q & A) on Open Science

The LSE Impact Blog – Six principles for assessing scientists for hiring, promotion, and tenure

The European Charter for Researchers – The European Charter for Researchers is a set of general principles and requirements which specifies the roles, responsibilities and entitlements of researchers

Rights and permissions

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ ), which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

The images or other third party material in this chapter are included in the chapter's Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the chapter's Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder.

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2023 The Author(s)

About this chapter

Barać, L. (2023). Research Environment. In: Marusic, A. (eds) A Guide to Responsible Research. Collaborative Bioethics, vol 1. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-22412-6_1

Download citation

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-22412-6_1

Published : 28 March 2023

Publisher Name : Springer, Cham

Print ISBN : 978-3-031-22411-9

Online ISBN : 978-3-031-22412-6

eBook Packages : Biomedical and Life Sciences Biomedical and Life Sciences (R0)

Share this chapter

Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:

Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.

Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative

• Publish with us

Policies and ethics

• Find a journal
• Track your research

Scholars' Bank

Environmental studies theses and dissertations.

• By Issue Date

Search within this collection:

Recent Submissions

• AN ACCUMULATION OF CATASTROPHE: A POLITICAL ECONOMY OF WILDFIRE IN THE WESTERN UNITED STATES  Dockstader, Sue ( University of Oregon , 2024-03-25 ) This dissertation is an environmental sociological study of wildland fire in what is now the western United States. It examines wildfire management from roughly the 1900s to the present time employing a Marxist historical ...
• Managing Life's Future: Species Essentialism and Evolutionary Normativity in Conservation Policy, Practice, and Imaginaries  Maggiulli, Katrina ( University of Oregon , 2024-01-10 ) Folk essentialist and normative understandings of species are not only prevalent in popular layperson communities, but also end up undergirding United States conservation policy and practice due to the simplistic clarity ...
• Unsettled Ecologies: Alienated Species, Indigenous Restoration, and U.S. Empire in a Time of Climate Chaos  Fink, Lisa ( University of Oregon , 2024-01-10 ) This dissertation traces environmental thinking about invasive species from Western-colonial, diasporic settlers of color, and Indigenous perspectives within U.S. settler colonialism. Considering environmental discourses ...
• Futuremaking in a Disaster Zone: Everyday Climate Change Adaptation amongst Quechua Women in the Peruvian Cordillera Blanca  Moulton, Holly ( University of Oregon , 2024-01-10 ) Indigenous women in Peru are often labeled “triply vulnerable” to climate change due to race, gender, and economic marginalization. Despite Peru’s focus on gender, Indigeneity, and intersectionality in national adaptation ...
• Land Acts: Land's Agency in American Literature, Law, and History from the Colonial Period to Removal  Keeler, Kyle ( University of Oregon , 2024-01-10 ) This dissertation examines land’s agency and relationships to land in the places now known as the United States as these relationships appear in literature and law from early colonization to the removal period. Land Acts ...
• PALEOTEMPERATURE, VEGETATION CHANGE, FIRE HISTORY, AND LAKE PRODUCTIVITY FOR THE LAST 14,500 YEARS AT GOLD LAKE, PACIFIC NORTHWEST, USA  Baig, Jamila ( University of Oregon , 2024-01-09 ) The postglacial history of vegetation, wildfire, and climate in the Cascade Range (Oregon) is only partly understood. This study uses high-resolution analysis from a 13-meter, 14,500-year sediment core from Gold Lake to ...
• On Western Juniper Climate Relations  Reis, Schyler ( University of Oregon , 2022-10-26 ) Western juniper woodlands are highly sensitive to climate in terms of tree-ring growth, seedling establishment and range distribution. Understanding the dynamics of western juniper woodlands to changes in precipitation, ...
• Stories We Tell, Stories We Eat: Mexican Foodways, Cultural Identity, and Ideological Struggle in Netflix’s Taco Chronicles  Sanchez, Bela ( University of Oregon , 2022-10-26 ) Food is a biological necessity imbued with numerous social, cultural, and economic implications for identity production and everyday meaning-making. Food television is a unique medium for the meanings of food and foodways ...
• Soil Nutrient Additions Shift Orthopteran Herbivory and Invertebrate Community Composition  Altmire, Gabriella ( University of Oregon , 2022-10-26 ) Anthropogenic alterations to global pools of nitrogen and phosphorus are driving declines in plant diversity across grasslands. As such, concern over biodiversity loss has precipitated a host of studies investigating how ...
• Multispecies Memoir: Self, Genre, and Species Justice in Contemporary Culture  Otjen, Nathaniel ( University of Oregon , 2022-10-04 ) Liberal humanism articulates an individual, rational, autonomous, universal, and singularly human subject that possesses various rights and freedoms. Although the imagined subject at the heart of liberal humanist philosophy ...
• Understanding How Changes in Disturbance Regimes and Long-Term Climate Shape Ecosystem and Landscape Structure and Function  Wright, Jamie ( University of Oregon , 2022-10-04 ) Long-term and anthropic climatic change intersecting with disturbances alters ecosystem structure and function across spatiotemporal scales. Quantifying ecosystem responses can be convoluted, therefore utilizing multiproxy ...
• Ikpíkyav (To Fix Again): Drawing From Karuk World Renewal To Contest Settler Discourses Of Vulnerability  Vinyeta, Kirsten ( University of Oregon , 2022-10-04 ) The Klamath River Basin of Northern California has historically been replete with fire-adapted ecosystems and Indigenous communities. For the Karuk Tribe, fire has been an indispensable tool for both spiritual practice and ...
• Grassland Restoration in Heterogeneous, Changing, and Human Dominated Systems  Brambila, Alejandro ( University of Oregon , 2022-10-04 ) Ecological restoration is a powerful tool to promote biodiversity and ecosystem function. Understanding underlying system variability and directional change can help predict outcomes of restoration interventions. Spatial ...
• Restoring What? And for Whom? Listening to Karuk Ecocultural Revitalization Practitioners and Uncovering Settler Logics in Ecological Restoration.  Worl, Sara ( University of Oregon , 2022-05-10 ) What does it mean to restore a landscape degraded by settler colonialism? How might a well intentionedprocess like ecological restoration end up causing harm from underlying settler colonial logics? This thesis explores ...
• Instigating Communities of Solidarity: An Exploration of Participatory, Informal, Temporary Urbanisms  Meier, Briana ( University of Oregon , 2021-11-23 ) This dissertationexamines the potential for participatory, informal urbanisms to buildcollaborative relations across ontological, cultural, and political difference. This research contributes to thefield of urban, environmental ...
• The Holy Oak School of Art and Ecology: A Proposal for Arts-Based Environmental Education Programming  Best, Krysta ( University of Oregon , 2021-11-23 ) The following is a proposal for arts-based environmental education programming in elementary schools, after-school programs, and day-camp programs, entitled the Holy School of Art and Ecology. Ecophenomenological, arts-based ...
• Settler Colonial Listening and the Silence of Wilderness in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area  Hilgren, Bailey ( University of Oregon , 2021-11-23 ) The Boundary Waters Canoe Area soundscape in northern Minnesota has a long and contested history but is most often characterized today as a pristine and distinctly silent wilderness. This thesis traces the construction and ...
• Species Dynamics and Restoration in Rare Serpentine Grasslands under Global Change  Hernandez, Eliza ( University of Oregon , 2021-11-23 ) Conserving rare serpentine grasslands is a challenge with ongoing nitrogen deposition. Nutrient-poor patches are fertilized by nitrogen-rich smog and exotic grasses can rapidly spread. Water resources are also being altered ...
• Place-making and Place-taking: An Analysis of Green Gentrification in Atlanta Georgia  Okotie-Oyekan, Aimée ( University of Oregon , 2021-11-23 ) Despite the benefits of urban greenspace, Atlanta’s Westside Park is causing gentrification and displacement pressures in Grove Park, a low-income African-American community in northwest Atlanta, Georgia. This study used ...
• Prairie Plant Responses to Climate Change in the Pacific Northwest  Reed, Paul ( University of Oregon , 2021-09-13 ) Understanding how plants respond to climate change is of paramount importance since their responses can affect ecosystem functions and patterns of biodiversity. At the population level, climate change may alter phenology ...

View more submissions

Search Scholars' Bank

All of scholars' bank, this collection.

• Dockstader, Sue (2)
• Maggiulli, Katrina (2)
• Shtob, Daniel (2)
• Vinyeta, Kirsten (2)
• Altmire, Gabriella (1)
• Au, Lokyee (1)
• Bacon, J. (1)
• Baig, Jamila (1)
• Belanger, Kevin M., 1985- (1)
• Best, Krysta (1)
• ... View More
• Climate change (12)
• Environmental justice (8)
• Conservation (3)
• Environmental Justice (3)
• Environmental studies (3)
• Pacific Northwest (3)
• Restoration (3)
• Tourism (3)
• Agriculture (2)

Date Issued

• 2020 - 2024 (24)
• 2010 - 2019 (51)
• 2003 - 2009 (11)

Has File(s)

• Most Popular Items
• Statistics by Country
• Most Popular Authors

Science and Technology in the Academic Enterprise: Status, Trends, and Issues (1989)

Chapter: the research environment.

Below is the uncorrected machine-read text of this chapter, intended to provide our own search engines and external engines with highly rich, chapter-representative searchable text of each book. Because it is UNCORRECTED material, please consider the following text as a useful but insufficient proxy for the authoritative book pages.

EMERGING TRENDS 17 Emerging Trends The ability of universities to broaden their missions and play a larger role in the nation's research enterprise will depend on the resolution of three sources of tension, each pulling at the fabric of the enterprise. The first strain on the enterprise is slow adaptation to an increasingly complex research and educational environment; the organization, culture, and resources of academic institutions and their research sponsors constrain their response to new demands and opportunities. The second source of stress on the enterprise is the replacement of retiring high-quality research personnel during the next decade; it may not be possible, given the current production level of research scientists and engineers. The third source emanates from the need to sustain the quality of current research institutions and programs, which is increasingly expensive to do and—in an era of severely constrained fiscal resources—increasingly difficult. THE RESEARCH ENVIRONMENT The environment in which the academic research community must function will increase in complexity. National and international economic, political, and social cross-currents influence the priorities, topics, and contexts of scientific investigation. These influences are combining to challenge the traditional way scholars and their host institutions operate and relate to each other. Furthermore, many new scientific and technological opportunities require more flexible, cross- disciplinary relationships both within and among universities, industries, and governments. There are many factors at work here. First, important and exciting advances in fundamental science are occurring are creating more complex questions on the research frontier and many of the questions are more frequently in multi-disciplinary settings at the interface between disciplines. Furthermore, some traditional fields, such as molecular biology and microelectronics, are merging with other fields or being redefined. Second, as product life cycles become shorter, advances in fundamental knowledge become more relevant to technology development. As a result, industries, universities, and financial institutions are developing sophisticated relationships that include a multiplicity of formal and informal structures. Some faculty members, for example, are assuming entrepreneurial roles, including developing relationships with non-academic organizations to pursue the commercial development of their research. Third, international cooperation is intensifying in many scientific and engineering fields. The growing research capabilities of other nations provide new opportunities for collaboration—especially in astronomy, oceanography, and high- energy physics—that require large capital investments. International cooperation is also required for research on such problems as global climate change, ozone depletion, and acid rain. New technologies increasingly shape the scholarly agenda in the sciences and engineering. State-of-the-art instrumentation allows for experiments requiring heretofore un-achievable precision and scale. New generations of computers make possible large-scale 

EMERGING TRENDS 18 data analysis and provide the mechanism for rapidly transferring and sharing information among institutions, organizations, and nations. News of new processes and products of scientific research reach an ever-wider U.S. audience. To the extent that popularization contributes to public understanding of science, it enhances political support. But it also brings greater societal scrutiny to the research enterprise. There is, for example, growing public pressure on federal regulatory and grant-making agencies to control the use of toxic substances and radioisotopes, and experiments involving animals. In addition, societal intervention in the research agenda is increasingly exercised through the courts, notably in environmental protection, radiation and carcinogen disposal, and the release of genetically engineered material. In addition to increasing regulatory complexity in some fields, the lack of regulations in other fields is also a problem—often forcing researchers to curtail or abandon lines of inquiry in areas such as biotechnology. The most pronounced recent trend is state and local regulation of research. A few state, county, and city governments have begun to influence the conduct of local university research through controls on the type and location of university facilities and on research protocols, such as the use and care of test animals and the use of genetically altered organisms. Should this trend become more widespread, investigators and their host institutions would have to adapt to a changing array of costly reporting requirements, safeguards, controls, and regulatory supervision. Universities and research sponsors face difficulty in rapidly adapting to a changing research environment. In response to the changing research environment, some members of the academic enterprise are testing innovative strategies for organizing, conducting, managing, and financing research. Rapid adaptation to new demands and opportunities in the research area, however, is slowed by many factors—including tradition, inertia, the competition for university resources, the demands of the university's educational mission, and the aging of faculty—impinging on the current organization, culture, and resources of university-based scholars and their funding agencies. There is growing debate within universities over the ability of the current disciplinary and governance structures to respond adequately to the expanding research agenda, as well as to find an appropriate balance of commitments to scholarship, education, and public service. New research opportunities often require more flexible budgeting and assignment of research faculty, inter-disciplinary approaches, expansion of non-faculty research personnel, extra-departmental initiatives, and allowance for faculty entrepreneurial activity. Furthermore, larger-scale multi-disciplinary research efforts require hierarchical management and more centralized governance structures for rapidly making strategic decisions and for inter- departmental planning. In addition, the intense regulatory environment in many areas of research requires active participation by the institution's administration in deciding faculty research topics and protocols, as well as in serving as a necessary buffer against unwarranted outside interference. On the other hand, the present university disciplinary structure has proved adaptable to new research opportunities and, more importantly, provides a necessary, albeit cumbersome, system for quality control through peer review. Young faculty, who are 

The U.S. academic research enterprise is entering a new era characterized by remarkable opportunities and increased strain. This two-part volume integrates the experiential knowledge of group members with quantitative data analyses in order to examine the status of scientific and technological research in academic settings. Part One reviews the status of the current research enterprise, emerging trends affecting it, and issues central to its future. Part Two is an overview of the enterprise and describes long-term trends in financial and human resources. This new book will be useful in stimulating policy discussions—especially among individuals and organizations that fund or perform academic research.

READ FREE ONLINE

Welcome to OpenBook!

You're looking at OpenBook, NAP.edu's online reading room since 1999. Based on feedback from you, our users, we've made some improvements that make it easier than ever to read thousands of publications on our website.

Do you want to take a quick tour of the OpenBook's features?

Show this book's table of contents , where you can jump to any chapter by name.

...or use these buttons to go back to the previous chapter or skip to the next one.

Jump up to the previous page or down to the next one. Also, you can type in a page number and press Enter to go directly to that page in the book.

To search the entire text of this book, type in your search term here and press Enter .

Share a link to this book page on your preferred social network or via email.

View our suggested citation for this chapter.

Ready to take your reading offline? Click here to buy this book in print or download it as a free PDF, if available.

Get Email Updates

Do you enjoy reading reports from the Academies online for free ? Sign up for email notifications and we'll let you know about new publications in your areas of interest when they're released.

• Privacy Policy

Home » 500+ Qualitative Research Titles and Topics

500+ Qualitative Research Titles and Topics

Table of Contents

Qualitative research is a methodological approach that involves gathering and analyzing non-numerical data to understand and interpret social phenomena. Unlike quantitative research , which emphasizes the collection of numerical data through surveys and experiments, qualitative research is concerned with exploring the subjective experiences, perspectives, and meanings of individuals and groups. As such, qualitative research topics can be diverse and encompass a wide range of social issues and phenomena. From exploring the impact of culture on identity formation to examining the experiences of marginalized communities, qualitative research offers a rich and nuanced perspective on complex social issues. In this post, we will explore some of the most compelling qualitative research topics and provide some tips on how to conduct effective qualitative research.

Qualitative Research Titles

Qualitative research titles often reflect the study’s focus on understanding the depth and complexity of human behavior, experiences, or social phenomena. Here are some examples across various fields:

• “Understanding the Impact of Project-Based Learning on Student Engagement in High School Classrooms: A Qualitative Study”
• “Navigating the Transition: Experiences of International Students in American Universities”
• “The Role of Parental Involvement in Early Childhood Education: Perspectives from Teachers and Parents”
• “Exploring the Effects of Teacher Feedback on Student Motivation and Self-Efficacy in Middle Schools”
• “Digital Literacy in the Classroom: Teacher Strategies for Integrating Technology in Elementary Education”
• “Culturally Responsive Teaching Practices: A Case Study in Diverse Urban Schools”
• “The Influence of Extracurricular Activities on Academic Achievement: Student Perspectives”
• “Barriers to Implementing Inclusive Education in Public Schools: A Qualitative Inquiry”
• “Teacher Professional Development and Its Impact on Classroom Practice: A Qualitative Exploration”
• “Student-Centered Learning Environments: A Qualitative Study of Classroom Dynamics and Outcomes”
• “The Experience of First-Year Teachers: Challenges, Support Systems, and Professional Growth”
• “Exploring the Role of School Leadership in Fostering a Positive School Culture”
• “Peer Relationships and Learning Outcomes in Cooperative Learning Settings: A Qualitative Analysis”
• “The Impact of Social Media on Student Learning and Engagement: Teacher and Student Perspectives”
• “Understanding Special Education Needs: Parent and Teacher Perceptions of Support Services in Schools

Health Science

• “Living with Chronic Pain: Patient Narratives and Coping Strategies in Managing Daily Life”
• “Healthcare Professionals’ Perspectives on the Challenges of Rural Healthcare Delivery”
• “Exploring the Mental Health Impacts of COVID-19 on Frontline Healthcare Workers: A Qualitative Study”
• “Patient and Family Experiences of Palliative Care: Understanding Needs and Preferences”
• “The Role of Community Health Workers in Improving Access to Maternal Healthcare in Rural Areas”
• “Barriers to Mental Health Services Among Ethnic Minorities: A Qualitative Exploration”
• “Understanding Patient Satisfaction in Telemedicine Services: A Qualitative Study of User Experiences”
• “The Impact of Cultural Competence Training on Healthcare Provider-Patient Communication”
• “Navigating the Transition to Adult Healthcare Services: Experiences of Adolescents with Chronic Conditions”
• “Exploring the Use of Alternative Medicine Among Patients with Chronic Diseases: A Qualitative Inquiry”
• “The Role of Social Support in the Rehabilitation Process of Stroke Survivors”
• “Healthcare Decision-Making Among Elderly Patients: A Qualitative Study of Preferences and Influences”
• “Nurse Perceptions of Patient Safety Culture in Hospital Settings: A Qualitative Analysis”
• “Experiences of Women with Postpartum Depression: Barriers to Seeking Help”
• “The Impact of Nutrition Education on Eating Behaviors Among College Students: A Qualitative Approach”
• “Understanding Resilience in Survivors of Childhood Trauma: A Narrative Inquiry”
• “The Role of Mindfulness in Managing Work-Related Stress Among Corporate Employees: A Qualitative Study”
• “Coping Mechanisms Among Parents of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder”
• “Exploring the Psychological Impact of Social Isolation in the Elderly: A Phenomenological Study”
• “Identity Formation in Adolescence: The Influence of Social Media and Peer Groups”
• “The Experience of Forgiveness in Interpersonal Relationships: A Qualitative Exploration”
• “Perceptions of Happiness and Well-Being Among University Students: A Cultural Perspective”
• “The Impact of Art Therapy on Anxiety and Depression in Adult Cancer Patients”
• “Narratives of Recovery: A Qualitative Study on the Journey Through Addiction Rehabilitation”
• “Exploring the Psychological Effects of Long-Term Unemployment: A Grounded Theory Approach”
• “Attachment Styles and Their Influence on Adult Romantic Relationships: A Qualitative Analysis”
• “The Role of Personal Values in Career Decision-Making Among Young Adults”
• “Understanding the Stigma of Mental Illness in Rural Communities: A Qualitative Inquiry”
• “Exploring the Use of Digital Mental Health Interventions Among Adolescents: A Qualitative Study”
• “The Psychological Impact of Climate Change on Young Adults: An Exploration of Anxiety and Action”
• “Navigating Identity: The Role of Social Media in Shaping Youth Culture and Self-Perception”
• “Community Resilience in the Face of Urban Gentrification: A Case Study of Neighborhood Change”
• “The Dynamics of Intergenerational Relationships in Immigrant Families: A Qualitative Analysis”
• “Social Capital and Economic Mobility in Low-Income Neighborhoods: An Ethnographic Approach”
• “Gender Roles and Career Aspirations Among Young Adults in Conservative Societies”
• “The Stigma of Mental Health in the Workplace: Employee Narratives and Organizational Culture”
• “Exploring the Intersection of Race, Class, and Education in Urban School Systems”
• “The Impact of Digital Divide on Access to Healthcare Information in Rural Communities”
• “Social Movements and Political Engagement Among Millennials: A Qualitative Study”
• “Cultural Adaptation and Identity Among Second-Generation Immigrants: A Phenomenological Inquiry”
• “The Role of Religious Institutions in Providing Community Support and Social Services”
• “Negotiating Public Space: Experiences of LGBTQ+ Individuals in Urban Environments”
• “The Sociology of Food: Exploring Eating Habits and Food Practices Across Cultures”
• “Work-Life Balance Challenges Among Dual-Career Couples: A Qualitative Exploration”
• “The Influence of Peer Networks on Substance Use Among Adolescents: A Community Study”

Business and Management

• “Navigating Organizational Change: Employee Perceptions and Adaptation Strategies in Mergers and Acquisitions”
• “Corporate Social Responsibility: Consumer Perceptions and Brand Loyalty in the Retail Sector”
• “Leadership Styles and Organizational Culture: A Comparative Study of Tech Startups”
• “Workplace Diversity and Inclusion: Best Practices and Challenges in Multinational Corporations”
• “Consumer Trust in E-commerce: A Qualitative Study of Online Shopping Behaviors”
• “The Gig Economy and Worker Satisfaction: Exploring the Experiences of Freelance Professionals”
• “Entrepreneurial Resilience: Success Stories and Lessons Learned from Failed Startups”
• “Employee Engagement and Productivity in Remote Work Settings: A Post-Pandemic Analysis”
• “Brand Storytelling: How Narrative Strategies Influence Consumer Engagement”
• “Sustainable Business Practices: Stakeholder Perspectives in the Fashion Industry”
• “Cross-Cultural Communication Challenges in Global Teams: Strategies for Effective Collaboration”
• “Innovative Workspaces: The Impact of Office Design on Creativity and Collaboration”
• “Consumer Perceptions of Artificial Intelligence in Customer Service: A Qualitative Exploration”
• “The Role of Mentoring in Career Development: Insights from Women in Leadership Positions”
• “Agile Management Practices: Adoption and Impact in Traditional Industries”

Environmental Studies

• “Community-Based Conservation Efforts in Tropical Rainforests: A Qualitative Study of Local Perspectives and Practices”
• “Urban Sustainability Initiatives: Exploring Resident Participation and Impact in Green City Projects”
• “Perceptions of Climate Change Among Indigenous Populations: Insights from Traditional Ecological Knowledge”
• “Environmental Justice and Industrial Pollution: A Case Study of Community Advocacy and Response”
• “The Role of Eco-Tourism in Promoting Conservation Awareness: Perspectives from Tour Operators and Visitors”
• “Sustainable Agriculture Practices Among Smallholder Farmers: Challenges and Opportunities”
• “Youth Engagement in Climate Action Movements: Motivations, Perceptions, and Outcomes”
• “Corporate Environmental Responsibility: A Qualitative Analysis of Stakeholder Expectations and Company Practices”
• “The Impact of Plastic Pollution on Marine Ecosystems: Community Awareness and Behavioral Change”
• “Renewable Energy Adoption in Rural Communities: Barriers, Facilitators, and Social Implications”
• “Water Scarcity and Community Adaptation Strategies in Arid Regions: A Grounded Theory Approach”
• “Urban Green Spaces: Public Perceptions and Use Patterns in Megacities”
• “Environmental Education in Schools: Teachers’ Perspectives on Integrating Sustainability into Curricula”
• “The Influence of Environmental Activism on Policy Change: Case Studies of Grassroots Campaigns”
• “Cultural Practices and Natural Resource Management: A Qualitative Study of Indigenous Stewardship Models”

Anthropology

• “Kinship and Social Organization in Matrilineal Societies: An Ethnographic Study”
• “Rituals and Beliefs Surrounding Death and Mourning in Diverse Cultures: A Comparative Analysis”
• “The Impact of Globalization on Indigenous Languages and Cultural Identity”
• “Food Sovereignty and Traditional Agricultural Practices Among Indigenous Communities”
• “Navigating Modernity: The Integration of Traditional Healing Practices in Contemporary Healthcare Systems”
• “Gender Roles and Equality in Hunter-Gatherer Societies: An Anthropological Perspective”
• “Sacred Spaces and Religious Practices: An Ethnographic Study of Pilgrimage Sites”
• “Youth Subcultures and Resistance: An Exploration of Identity and Expression in Urban Environments”
• “Cultural Constructions of Disability and Inclusion: A Cross-Cultural Analysis”
• “Interethnic Marriages and Cultural Syncretism: Case Studies from Multicultural Societies”
• “The Role of Folklore and Storytelling in Preserving Cultural Heritage”
• “Economic Anthropology of Gift-Giving and Reciprocity in Tribal Communities”
• “Digital Anthropology: The Role of Social Media in Shaping Political Movements”
• “Migration and Diaspora: Maintaining Cultural Identity in Transnational Communities”
• “Cultural Adaptations to Climate Change Among Coastal Fishing Communities”

Communication Studies

• “The Dynamics of Family Communication in the Digital Age: A Qualitative Inquiry”
• “Narratives of Identity and Belonging in Diaspora Communities Through Social Media”
• “Organizational Communication and Employee Engagement: A Case Study in the Non-Profit Sector”
• “Cultural Influences on Communication Styles in Multinational Teams: An Ethnographic Approach”
• “Media Representation of Women in Politics: A Content Analysis and Audience Perception Study”
• “The Role of Communication in Building Sustainable Community Development Projects”
• “Interpersonal Communication in Online Dating: Strategies, Challenges, and Outcomes”
• “Public Health Messaging During Pandemics: A Qualitative Study of Community Responses”
• “The Impact of Mobile Technology on Parent-Child Communication in the Digital Era”
• “Crisis Communication Strategies in the Hospitality Industry: A Case Study of Reputation Management”
• “Narrative Analysis of Personal Stories Shared on Mental Health Blogs”
• “The Influence of Podcasts on Political Engagement Among Young Adults”
• “Visual Communication and Brand Identity: A Qualitative Study of Consumer Interpretations”
• “Communication Barriers in Cross-Cultural Healthcare Settings: Patient and Provider Perspectives”
• “The Role of Internal Communication in Managing Organizational Change: Employee Experiences”

Information Technology

• “User Experience Design in Augmented Reality Applications: A Qualitative Study of Best Practices”
• “The Human Factor in Cybersecurity: Understanding Employee Behaviors and Attitudes Towards Phishing”
• “Adoption of Cloud Computing in Small and Medium Enterprises: Challenges and Success Factors”
• “Blockchain Technology in Supply Chain Management: A Qualitative Exploration of Potential Impacts”
• “The Role of Artificial Intelligence in Personalizing User Experiences on E-commerce Platforms”
• “Digital Transformation in Traditional Industries: A Case Study of Technology Adoption Challenges”
• “Ethical Considerations in the Development of Smart Home Technologies: A Stakeholder Analysis”
• “The Impact of Social Media Algorithms on News Consumption and Public Opinion”
• “Collaborative Software Development: Practices and Challenges in Open Source Projects”
• “Understanding the Digital Divide: Access to Information Technology in Rural Communities”
• “Data Privacy Concerns and User Trust in Internet of Things (IoT) Devices”
• “The Effectiveness of Gamification in Educational Software: A Qualitative Study of Engagement and Motivation”
• “Virtual Teams and Remote Work: Communication Strategies and Tools for Effectiveness”
• “User-Centered Design in Mobile Health Applications: Evaluating Usability and Accessibility”
• “The Influence of Technology on Work-Life Balance: Perspectives from IT Professionals”

Tourism and Hospitality

• “Exploring the Authenticity of Cultural Heritage Tourism in Indigenous Communities”
• “Sustainable Tourism Practices: Perceptions and Implementations in Small Island Destinations”
• “The Impact of Social Media Influencers on Destination Choice Among Millennials”
• “Gastronomy Tourism: Exploring the Culinary Experiences of International Visitors in Rural Regions”
• “Eco-Tourism and Conservation: Stakeholder Perspectives on Balancing Tourism and Environmental Protection”
• “The Role of Hospitality in Enhancing the Cultural Exchange Experience of Exchange Students”
• “Dark Tourism: Visitor Motivations and Experiences at Historical Conflict Sites”
• “Customer Satisfaction in Luxury Hotels: A Qualitative Study of Service Excellence and Personalization”
• “Adventure Tourism: Understanding the Risk Perception and Safety Measures Among Thrill-Seekers”
• “The Influence of Local Communities on Tourist Experiences in Ecotourism Sites”
• “Event Tourism: Economic Impacts and Community Perspectives on Large-Scale Music Festivals”
• “Heritage Tourism and Identity: Exploring the Connections Between Historic Sites and National Identity”
• “Tourist Perceptions of Sustainable Accommodation Practices: A Study of Green Hotels”
• “The Role of Language in Shaping the Tourist Experience in Multilingual Destinations”
• “Health and Wellness Tourism: Motivations and Experiences of Visitors to Spa and Retreat Centers”

Qualitative Research Topics

Qualitative Research Topics are as follows:

• Understanding the lived experiences of first-generation college students
• Exploring the impact of social media on self-esteem among adolescents
• Investigating the effects of mindfulness meditation on stress reduction
• Analyzing the perceptions of employees regarding organizational culture
• Examining the impact of parental involvement on academic achievement of elementary school students
• Investigating the role of music therapy in managing symptoms of depression
• Understanding the experience of women in male-dominated industries
• Exploring the factors that contribute to successful leadership in non-profit organizations
• Analyzing the effects of peer pressure on substance abuse among adolescents
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with disabilities in the workplace
• Understanding the factors that contribute to burnout among healthcare professionals
• Examining the impact of social support on mental health outcomes
• Analyzing the perceptions of parents regarding sex education in schools
• Investigating the experiences of immigrant families in the education system
• Understanding the impact of trauma on mental health outcomes
• Exploring the effectiveness of animal-assisted therapy for individuals with anxiety
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful intergenerational relationships
• Investigating the experiences of LGBTQ+ individuals in the workplace
• Understanding the impact of online gaming on social skills development among adolescents
• Examining the perceptions of teachers regarding technology integration in the classroom
• Analyzing the experiences of women in leadership positions
• Investigating the factors that contribute to successful marriage and long-term relationships
• Understanding the impact of social media on political participation
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with mental health disorders in the criminal justice system
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful community-based programs for youth development
• Investigating the experiences of veterans in accessing mental health services
• Understanding the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on mental health outcomes
• Examining the perceptions of parents regarding childhood obesity prevention
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful multicultural education programs
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with chronic illnesses in the workplace
• Understanding the impact of poverty on academic achievement
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with autism spectrum disorder in the workplace
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful employee retention strategies
• Investigating the experiences of caregivers of individuals with Alzheimer’s disease
• Understanding the impact of parent-child communication on adolescent sexual behavior
• Examining the perceptions of college students regarding mental health services on campus
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful team building in the workplace
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with eating disorders in treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of mentorship on career success
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with physical disabilities in the workplace
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful community-based programs for mental health
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with substance use disorders in treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of social media on romantic relationships
• Examining the perceptions of parents regarding child discipline strategies
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful cross-cultural communication in the workplace
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with anxiety disorders in treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of cultural differences on healthcare delivery
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with hearing loss in the workplace
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful parent-teacher communication
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with depression in treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of childhood trauma on adult mental health outcomes
• Examining the perceptions of college students regarding alcohol and drug use on campus
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful mentor-mentee relationships
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with intellectual disabilities in the workplace
• Understanding the impact of work-family balance on employee satisfaction and well-being
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with autism spectrum disorder in vocational rehabilitation programs
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful project management in the construction industry
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with substance use disorders in peer support groups
• Understanding the impact of mindfulness meditation on stress reduction and mental health
• Examining the perceptions of parents regarding childhood nutrition
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful environmental sustainability initiatives in organizations
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with bipolar disorder in treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of job stress on employee burnout and turnover
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with physical disabilities in recreational activities
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful strategic planning in nonprofit organizations
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with hoarding disorder in treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of culture on leadership styles and effectiveness
• Examining the perceptions of college students regarding sexual health education on campus
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful supply chain management in the retail industry
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with personality disorders in treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of multiculturalism on group dynamics in the workplace
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with chronic pain in mindfulness-based pain management programs
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful employee engagement strategies in organizations
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with internet addiction disorder in treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of social comparison on body dissatisfaction and self-esteem
• Examining the perceptions of parents regarding childhood sleep habits
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful diversity and inclusion initiatives in organizations
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with schizophrenia in treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of job crafting on employee motivation and job satisfaction
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with vision impairments in navigating public spaces
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful customer relationship management strategies in the service industry
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with dissociative amnesia in treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of cultural intelligence on intercultural communication and collaboration
• Examining the perceptions of college students regarding campus diversity and inclusion efforts
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful supply chain sustainability initiatives in organizations
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with obsessive-compulsive disorder in treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of transformational leadership on organizational performance and employee well-being
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with mobility impairments in public transportation
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful talent management strategies in organizations
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with substance use disorders in harm reduction programs
• Understanding the impact of gratitude practices on well-being and resilience
• Examining the perceptions of parents regarding childhood mental health and well-being
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful corporate social responsibility initiatives in organizations
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with borderline personality disorder in treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of emotional labor on job stress and burnout
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with hearing impairments in healthcare settings
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful customer experience strategies in the hospitality industry
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with gender dysphoria in gender-affirming healthcare
• Understanding the impact of cultural differences on cross-cultural negotiation in the global marketplace
• Examining the perceptions of college students regarding academic stress and mental health
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful supply chain agility in organizations
• Understanding the impact of music therapy on mental health and well-being
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with dyslexia in educational settings
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful leadership in nonprofit organizations
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with chronic illnesses in online support groups
• Understanding the impact of exercise on mental health and well-being
• Examining the perceptions of parents regarding childhood screen time
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful change management strategies in organizations
• Understanding the impact of cultural differences on international business negotiations
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with hearing impairments in the workplace
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful team building in corporate settings
• Understanding the impact of technology on communication in romantic relationships
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful community engagement strategies for local governments
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of financial stress on mental health and well-being
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful mentorship programs in organizations
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with gambling addictions in treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of social media on body image and self-esteem
• Examining the perceptions of parents regarding childhood education
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful virtual team management strategies
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with dissociative identity disorder in treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of cultural differences on cross-cultural communication in healthcare settings
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with chronic pain in cognitive-behavioral therapy programs
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful community-building strategies in urban neighborhoods
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with alcohol use disorders in treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of personality traits on romantic relationships
• Examining the perceptions of college students regarding mental health stigma on campus
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful fundraising strategies for political campaigns
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with traumatic brain injuries in rehabilitation programs
• Understanding the impact of social support on mental health and well-being among the elderly
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with chronic illnesses in medical treatment decision-making processes
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful innovation strategies in organizations
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with dissociative disorders in treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of cultural differences on cross-cultural communication in education settings
• Examining the perceptions of parents regarding childhood physical activity
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful conflict resolution in family relationships
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with opioid use disorders in treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of emotional intelligence on leadership effectiveness
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with learning disabilities in the workplace
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful change management in educational institutions
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with eating disorders in recovery support groups
• Understanding the impact of self-compassion on mental health and well-being
• Examining the perceptions of college students regarding campus safety and security measures
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful marketing strategies for nonprofit organizations
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with postpartum depression in treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of ageism in the workplace
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with dyslexia in the education system
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with anxiety disorders in cognitive-behavioral therapy programs
• Understanding the impact of socioeconomic status on access to healthcare
• Examining the perceptions of parents regarding childhood screen time usage
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful supply chain management strategies
• Understanding the impact of parenting styles on child development
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with addiction in harm reduction programs
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful crisis management strategies in organizations
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with trauma in trauma-focused therapy programs
• Examining the perceptions of healthcare providers regarding patient-centered care
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful product development strategies
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with autism spectrum disorder in employment programs
• Understanding the impact of cultural competence on healthcare outcomes
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with chronic illnesses in healthcare navigation
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful community engagement strategies for non-profit organizations
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with physical disabilities in the workplace
• Understanding the impact of childhood trauma on adult mental health
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful supply chain sustainability strategies
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with personality disorders in dialectical behavior therapy programs
• Understanding the impact of gender identity on mental health treatment seeking behaviors
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with schizophrenia in community-based treatment programs
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful project team management strategies
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with obsessive-compulsive disorder in exposure and response prevention therapy programs
• Understanding the impact of cultural competence on academic achievement and success
• Examining the perceptions of college students regarding academic integrity
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful social media marketing strategies
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with bipolar disorder in community-based treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of mindfulness on academic achievement and success
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with substance use disorders in medication-assisted treatment programs
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with anxiety disorders in exposure therapy programs
• Understanding the impact of healthcare disparities on health outcomes
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful supply chain optimization strategies
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with borderline personality disorder in schema therapy programs
• Understanding the impact of culture on perceptions of mental health stigma
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with trauma in art therapy programs
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful digital marketing strategies
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with eating disorders in online support groups
• Understanding the impact of workplace bullying on job satisfaction and performance
• Examining the perceptions of college students regarding mental health resources on campus
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful supply chain risk management strategies
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with chronic pain in mindfulness-based pain management programs
• Understanding the impact of cognitive-behavioral therapy on social anxiety disorder
• Understanding the impact of COVID-19 on mental health and well-being
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with eating disorders in treatment programs
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful leadership in business organizations
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with chronic pain in cognitive-behavioral therapy programs
• Understanding the impact of cultural differences on intercultural communication
• Examining the perceptions of teachers regarding inclusive education for students with disabilities
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with depression in therapy programs
• Understanding the impact of workplace culture on employee retention and turnover
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with traumatic brain injuries in rehabilitation programs
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful crisis communication strategies in organizations
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with anxiety disorders in mindfulness-based interventions
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with chronic illnesses in healthcare settings
• Understanding the impact of technology on work-life balance
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with learning disabilities in academic settings
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful entrepreneurship in small businesses
• Understanding the impact of gender identity on mental health and well-being
• Examining the perceptions of individuals with disabilities regarding accessibility in public spaces
• Understanding the impact of religion on coping strategies for stress and anxiety
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with chronic illnesses in complementary and alternative medicine treatments
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful customer retention strategies in business organizations
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with postpartum depression in therapy programs
• Understanding the impact of ageism on older adults in healthcare settings
• Examining the perceptions of students regarding online learning during the COVID-19 pandemic
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful team building in virtual work environments
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with gambling disorders in treatment programs
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with chronic illnesses in peer support groups
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful social media marketing strategies for businesses
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with ADHD in treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of sleep on cognitive and emotional functioning
• Examining the perceptions of individuals with chronic illnesses regarding healthcare access and affordability
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with borderline personality disorder in dialectical behavior therapy programs
• Understanding the impact of social support on caregiver well-being
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with chronic illnesses in disability activism
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful cultural competency training programs in healthcare settings
• Understanding the impact of personality disorders on interpersonal relationships
• Examining the perceptions of healthcare providers regarding the use of telehealth services
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with dissociative disorders in therapy programs
• Understanding the impact of gender bias in hiring practices
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with visual impairments in the workplace
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful diversity and inclusion programs in the workplace
• Understanding the impact of online dating on romantic relationships
• Examining the perceptions of parents regarding childhood vaccination
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful communication in healthcare settings
• Understanding the impact of cultural stereotypes on academic achievement
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with substance use disorders in sober living programs
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful classroom management strategies
• Understanding the impact of social support on addiction recovery
• Examining the perceptions of college students regarding mental health stigma
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful conflict resolution in the workplace
• Understanding the impact of race and ethnicity on healthcare access and outcomes
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with post-traumatic stress disorder in treatment programs
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful project management strategies
• Understanding the impact of teacher-student relationships on academic achievement
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful customer service strategies
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with social anxiety disorder in treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of workplace stress on job satisfaction and performance
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with disabilities in sports and recreation
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful marketing strategies for small businesses
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with phobias in treatment programs
• Understanding the impact of culture on attitudes towards mental health and illness
• Examining the perceptions of college students regarding sexual assault prevention
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful time management strategies
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with addiction in recovery support groups
• Understanding the impact of mindfulness on emotional regulation and well-being
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with chronic pain in treatment programs
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful conflict resolution in romantic relationships
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with autism spectrum disorder in social skills training programs
• Understanding the impact of parent-child communication on adolescent substance use
• Examining the perceptions of parents regarding childhood mental health services
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful fundraising strategies for non-profit organizations
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with chronic illnesses in support groups
• Understanding the impact of personality traits on career success and satisfaction
• Exploring the experiences of individuals with disabilities in accessing public transportation
• Analyzing the factors that contribute to successful team building in sports teams
• Investigating the experiences of individuals with chronic pain in alternative medicine treatments
• Understanding the impact of stigma on mental health treatment seeking behaviors
• Examining the perceptions of college students regarding diversity and inclusion on campus.

About the author

Muhammad Hassan

Researcher, Academic Writer, Web developer

You may also like

200+ Funny Research Topics

500+ Sports Research Topics

300+ American History Research Paper Topics

500+ Cyber Security Research Topics

500+ Environmental Research Topics

500+ Economics Research Topics

An official website of the United States government

Here’s how you know

Official websites use .gov A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.

Secure .gov websites use HTTPS A lock ( Lock A locked padlock ) or https:// means you’ve safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

JavaScript appears to be disabled on this computer. Please click here to see any active alerts .

Wildland Fires and Smoke

Smoke from wildland fires can degrade air quality in the United States. EPA, the U.S. Forest Service, and other federal, state and community agencies and organizations are working together to share ways you can help protect your health from any type of wildland fire smoke. You can use the resources on this page to prepare for and protect yourself from wildland fire. Tips for protecting yourself from wildfire also work for prescribed fire. 

On this page:

• Wildland Fire Basics 

AirKnowledge

Indoor air quality, wildfire and smoke research, researcher spotlight: jason sacks, wildland fire basics, what is a wildland fire .

A wildland fire is any fire that occurs in an area where there is little to no human activity or development. These areas can include forests, shrublands, grasslands, or wetlands. 

 Wildland fires include: 

Wildfires, which are unplanned and can be started naturally – such as by lighting or volcanoes – or through accidental or unauthorized actions by humans. 

Prescribed fires, which are planned fires ignited by experts that are used for several beneficial objectives, including reducing fuels to limit the size of future wildfires. 

While everyone can be impacted by wildland fire smoke, healthy people are usually not at a major risk from wildland fire smoke. However, people with heart or lung disease, older adults, children and teenagers, and people who are more likely to be exposed are at increased risk of experiencing health effects. There is evidence that pregnant people and those who have limited access to measures to reduce their exposure also may be at greater risk of health impacts. If you are at increased risk from wildland fire smoke, you are also at increased risk from extreme heat. Symptoms may include burning eyes, runny nose, and illnesses such as bronchitis. 

What is AirNow and why is it important?

AirNow is your one-stop source for air quality data. The AirNow site highlights air quality in your local area first, and also provides air quality information at state and national views.

AirNow's data provides high-quality information that is reported by partners in a consistent format. It is available to the public, researchers, businesses, educators, and to other data systems.

What is the AirNow Fire and Smoke Map?

EPA and the U.S. Forest Service have developed the AirNow Fire and Smoke Map to provide the public information on fire locations, smoke plumes, near real-time air quality and protective actions to take—all in one place. To give users the most localized air quality information possible, the map pulls data from monitors that regularly report to AirNow, temporary monitors such as those the Forest Service and air agencies have deployed near fires, and crowd-sourced data from more nearly 15,000 low-cost sensors that measure fine particle pollution, the major harmful pollutant in smoke. The map shows this data in the familiar color-coding of the U.S. Air Quality Index. 

When there are large wildfires in the U.S., the map provides direct access to Smoke Outlooks, which provide a forecast of smoke impacts to help those affected plan their activities so they can reduce their exposure to smoke and protect their health. 

You can view the Fire and Smoke Map at https://fire.airnow.gov/ or in the AirNow mobile app. To view the map in Spanish, click or tap the globe icon at the top of the map, and select Español. 

What is the U.S. Air Quality Index?

The U.S.  Air Quality Index  is a color-coded index designed to communicate whether air quality is healthy or unhealthy. When you know the AQI in your area, you can take steps to protect your health. Look up your area's AQI today! 

In February 2024, EPA announced updates to the AQI for PM2.5 to reflect the revised level of the primary (health-based) annual PM2.5 standard and to reflect recent health science on PM2.5. EPA has updated its AirNow products, including the AirNow website, AirNow app, and the AirNow Fire and Smoke Map. 

Learn more about the updates to the AQI for PM2.5. 

Is there a resource that will help me explain how wildfires impact air quality and health to children?  

Yes! Check out  Why is Coco Red?  

Children’s lungs are still growing and developing, so they are especially vulnerable to wildfire smoke, and it is critical to protect and educate children early on. 

Why is Coco Red?  is a picture book for children about Coco and his friends on an air quality adventure. Read how Coco, his little sister and his friends solve a mystery as they learn about how wildfires can affect air quality and health. This book is for all children, especially those with asthma, and their caretakers.

Visit AirNow to access Why is Coco Red? in Spanish, Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese, Korean, Navajo, Tagalog, and Vietnamese. The Why is Coco Red? video  is available on YouTube in English or Spanish. 

Where should I go for wildfire and smoke information?

Visit AirNow’s Wildfires page to learn what to do before, during and after a wildfire. 

Check the AirNow Fire and Smoke Map for up-to-date air quality information. 

Download the  AirNow App and use it to check the Airnow Fire and Smoke Map. 

Sign up for alerts: check with your state or local  or  Tribal air quality agency to find out how you can sign up for local air quality alerts. 

Check for  Smoke Outlooks . 

Visit EPA’s Smoke-Ready Toolbox  for a full list of wildfire-related resources. 

AirKnowledge is a partnership training program in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Office of Air Quality Planning Standards. AirKnowledge develops training materials with state and Tribal organizations for the public and EPA on the Clean Air Act program areas managed by OAQPS. The public and EPA staff can access training material through the AirKnowledge website . State, local and Tribal air agency users should view training offerings on the learning management system (LMS)  

AirKnowledge Learning Corner!

Complete the following self-instructional module that identifies resources and tools that aid in protecting human health from wildland fire smoke:

• Resources to Aid in Protecting Human Health from Wildland Fire Smoke - Overview (airknowledge.gov)

Test Your Knowledge

How often should you change air filters during a smoke event.

C is the correct answer.

D is the correct answer.

Hey... No Peeking!

You need to select an answer to the question before we'll show you the right answer...

How do wildfires impact indoor air quality and health?

During a wildfire, smoke can make the outdoor air unhealthy to breathe. Local officials may advise you to stay indoors during a smoke event. However, you should be aware that some of the smoke from outdoors can enter your home and make it unhealthy to breathe indoor air, too.

Where can I learn more about wildfires and indoor air quality?

Visit the Wildfires and Indoor Air Quality (IAQ) website for information on:

• How wildfire smoke affects indoor air quality.
• The Prepare for Fire Season fact sheet describes the key steps you should take to make sure you are prepared to protect your family's health in the event of a wildfire.  FEMA's How to Prepare for a Wildfire provides additional detail on how to protect yourself and your property.
• The Reduce Your Smoke Exposure fact sheet describes what you can do to reduce your exposure to wildfire smoke.
• The Protect Yourself from Ash fact sheet describes how you can protect yourself and your family and avoid getting ash in the indoor air while cleaning up.

What is a good way to protect indoor air quality during and after a wildfire smoke event?  

• Use a portable air cleaner in individual rooms. Run it as often as possible on the highest fan speed. Be sure to get a portable cleaner that is the right size for the room in which you will use it and make sure the portable air cleaner does not produce ozone.
• If you have central heat or aid conditioning, you can install a high-efficiency filter. Run the system's fan as often as possible to filter the outdoor air.
• Check the filters frequently and replace them when they are dirty.
• Learn more about air cleaners and filters with EPA's Guide to Air Cleaners in the Home .
• You can set up a specific room as a "clean room" where you keep levels of smoke and other particles as low as possible during wildfire smoke events.  Learn more about how to create a clean room at home.

But what if a portable air cleaner isn't available or it is outside your budget?

You may choose to use a do-it-yourself air cleaner. DIY air cleaners are made by attaching a furnace filter to a box fan with tape, brackets, or a bungee cord, and can serve as a temporary alternative to commercial air cleaners.

Multiple studies indicate that well-built DIY air cleaners can be of comparable effectiveness to commercial air cleaners in reducing airborne particles such as those in wildfire smoke. However, their performance can vary based on the chosen design and the quality of the materials and assembly. Therefore,  EPA does not recommend the routine use of DIY air cleaners as a permanent alternative to products of known performance (such as commercially available portable air cleaners).  For more information, see EPA's Research on DIY Air Cleaners to Reduce Wildfire Smoke Indoors .

Central furnace or HVAC filters are designed to filter air throughout a home. However, not all filters work the same. In general, what MERV rating is best for removing smoke particles from your air, if your system can accommodate it?

Why is wildfire research necessary in order to protect human health and the environment.

The West and other parts of the U.S. have experienced significant forest fires in recent years. EPA is using its expertise in air quality research to fill the gaps in scientific information and to develop tools to prevent and reduce the impact of smoke from wildfires and controlled or prescribed burns.

Visit  Wildland Fire Research to Protect Health and the Environment  to learn about the varying research areas, featured research and activities, and scientific publications.

What is an example of the wildfire smoke research being done by EPA and its partners?

EPA is conducting research to provide actionable information to help Americans stay safe during a wildfire. Everyone deserves access to cleaner indoor air during wildfire smoke events. But when there are smoky conditions from wildfires, commercial air cleaners can be difficult to obtain because of limited availability or high cost. EPA conducted  research to evaluate DIY air cleaners  to answer questions from EPA partners and the public about their effectiveness and safety.

This research is one part of a study called the Wildfire Advancing Science Partnerships for Indoor Reductions of Smoke Exposures Study . The objectives of the Wildfire ASPIRE Study are to better understand indoor air quality during smoke episodes and evaluate the effectiveness of interventions for reducing indoor smoke exposures and related public health risks. 

What is Smoke-Ready Communities research?

EPA and the U.S. Forest Service are leading a unique multidisciplinary and interagency study that is expected to offer assistance with planning for smoke events from fires. The research project involves community partners in a collaborative process to create community smoke response plans that can be implemented during smoky conditions. The partners are the city and county of Butte and Silver Bow in Montana, and Garfield County in Colorado, two counties increasingly impacted by wildfires.

Learn more at  Smoke-Ready Communities .

EPA epidemiologist Jason Sacks works to protect and improve air quality by leading the development of the particulate matter (PM) Integrated Science Assessment, which formed the scientific basis of the PM National Ambient Air Quality Standard. In addition, his recent work focuses on understanding the health risks of wildland fire smoke and how communities and individuals can prepare for and reduce smoke exposure. 

His advice for students considering a science career:

"You don't need to know exactly what you want to do for your career early on. You never know what experiences or situations you may be in over time that can take you in a different direction. I can honestly say I did not envision a career in environmental health, but now I can't image doing anything else."  Learn more about Jason.

When smoke is in the air, closing your doors and windows may not keep all of the smoke out. What can you use to filter particles in smoke from the indoor air?

• Air Quality Home
• Air Quality Awareness Week
• Air Quality Resources
• Air Quality Resources for Educators and Students
• 2024 Air Quality Awareness Week Toolkit

Climate risk and the opportunity for real estate

Climate change, previously a relatively peripheral concern for many real-estate players, has moved to the top of the agenda. Recently, investors  made net-zero commitments, regulators developed reporting standards, governments passed laws targeting emissions, employees demanded action, and tenants demanded more sustainable buildings. At the same time, the accelerating physical consequences of a changing climate are becoming more pronounced as communities face storms, floods, fires, extreme heat, and other risks.

These changes have brought a sense of urgency to the critical role of real-estate leaders in the climate transition, the period until 2050 during which the world will feel both the physical effects of climate change and the economic, social, and regulatory changes necessary to decarbonize. The climate transition not only creates new responsibilities for real-estate players to both revalue and future-proof their portfolios but also brings opportunities to create fresh sources of value.

The combination of this economic transition and the physical risks of climate change has created a significant risk of mispricing real estate across markets and asset classes. For example, a major North American bank conducted analysis that found dozens of assets in its real-estate portfolio that would likely be exposed to significant devaluations within the next ten years due to factors including increased rates of flooding and job losses due to the climate transition. Additionally, a study of a diversified equity portfolio found that, absent mitigating actions, climate risks could reduce annual returns toward the end of the decade by as much as 40 percent.

Leading real-estate players will figure out which of their assets are mispriced and in what direction and use this insight to inform their investment, asset management, and disposition choices. They will also decarbonize their assets, attracting the trillions of dollars of capital that has been committed to net zero and the thousands of tenants that have made similar commitments. They will then create new revenue sources related to the climate transition.

Building climate intelligence is central to value creation and strategic differentiation in the real-estate industry. But the reverse is also true: real estate is central to global climate change mitigation efforts. Real estate drives approximately 39 percent of total global emissions. Approximately 11 percent of these emissions are generated by manufacturing materials used in buildings (including steel and cement), while the rest is emitted from buildings themselves and by generating the energy that powers buildings. 1 2019 global status report for buildings and construction , International Energy Agency, December 2019.

In addition to the scale of its contribution to total emissions, real estate is critical in global decarbonization efforts for reasons likely to be compelling for investors, tenants, and governments. Significant reductions in emissions associated with real estate can be achieved with positive economics through technologies that already exist. For example, upgrading to more energy-efficient lighting systems and installing better insulation have positive financial returns. Today, newer technologies also make low-carbon heating and cooling systems, such as heat pumps and energy-efficient air conditioning, more cost competitive in many markets and climates. These cost-effective upgrades can create meaningful change while also derisking assets.

We suggest three actions real-estate players can take to thrive throughout the climate transition:

• Incorporate climate change risks into asset and portfolio valuations. This requires building the analytical capabilities to understand both direct and indirect physical and transition risks.
• Decarbonize real-estate assets and portfolios.
• Create new sources of value and revenue streams for investors, tenants, and communities.

Fundamental changes brought on by the climate transition will open new dimensions of competitive differentiation and value creation for real-estate players. More important, leaders will make a valuable contribution to the world’s ability to meet the global climate challenge.

Incorporate climate change risks into asset and portfolio valuations

Climate change’s physical and transition risks touch almost every aspect of a building’s operations and value. Physical risks are hazards caused by a changing climate, including both acute events, such as floods, fires, extreme heat, and storms, and chronic conditions, such as steadily rising sea levels and changing average temperatures. Transition risks include changes in the economy, regulation, consumer behavior, technology, and other human responses to climate change.

We do mind the gap

As we work with real-estate firms, we notice that investment teams increasingly recognize the impact of climate change on asset values. As one leader of valuations at a major real-estate-services firm recently commented to us: “This is the greatest deviation between modeled valuation and actual price that I’ve ever seen, and it’s because of climate.” A chief operating officer of a diversified real-estate investor told us, “We’ve seen underperformance of a cluster of our assets due to climate-related factors that just weren’t considered in our investment theses.”

The industry at large senses how values are shifting. A recent survey of finance experts and professionals conducted by researchers at New York University found that those who think real-estate asset prices reflect climate risks “not enough” outnumber those who think they reflect climate risks “too much” by 67 to 1 (in comparison with stock prices, in which the ratio was 20 to 1). 1 Johannes Stroebel and Jeffrey Wurgler, “What do you think about climate finance?,” Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance, September 3, 2021. The International Renewable Energy Agency has estimated that $7.5 trillion worth of real estate could be “stranded”; these are assets that will experience major write-downs in value given climate risks and the economic transition, making real estate one of the hardest-hit sectors. 2 Jean Eaglesham and Vipal Monga, “Trillions in assets may be left stranded as companies address climate change,” Wall Street Journal , November 20, 2021.

Physical and transition risks can affect assets, such as buildings, directly or indirectly, by having an impact on the markets with which the assets interact. A carbon-intensive building obviously faces regulatory, tenancy, investor, and other risks; over the long term, so does a building that exists in a carbon-intensive ecosystem. For example, a building supplied by a carbon-intensive energy grid or a carbon-intensive transportation system is exposed to the transition risks of those systems as well. All these changes add up to substantial valuation impacts for even diversified portfolios—an increasingly pressing concern for real-estate companies (see sidebar, “We do mind the gap”).

Physical risks, both direct and indirect, have an uneven effect on asset performance

Several major real-estate companies have recently conducted climate stress tests on their portfolios and found a significant impact on portfolio value, with potential losses for some debt portfolios doubling over the next several years. Notably, they found significant variation within the portfolios. Some assets, because of their carbon footprint, location, or tenant composition, would benefit from changes brought on by the climate transition, while others would suffer significant drops in value. The challenge for players is to determine which assets will be affected, in what ways, and how to respond. There is also opportunity for investors who can identify mispriced assets.

Direct physical consequences can be conspicuous: the value of homes in Florida exposed to changing climate-related risks are depressed by roughly $5 billion relative to unexposed homes. According to the Journal of Urban Economics , after Hurricane Sandy, housing prices were reduced by up to 8 percent in New York’s flood zones by 2017, reflecting a greater perception of risk by potential buyers. 2 Francesc Ortega and Süleyman Taspinar, “Rising sea levels and sinking property values: Hurricane Sandy and New York’s housing market,” Journal of Urban Economics , July 2018, Volume 106. In California, there has been a 61 percent annual jump in nonrenewals of insurance (due to higher prices and refused coverage) in areas of moderate-to-very-high fire risk. 3 Elaine Chen and Katherine Chiglinsky, “Many Californians being left without homeowners insurance due to wildfire risk,” Insurance Journal , December 4, 2020.

The indirect impacts of physical risk on assets can be harder to perceive, causing some real-estate players to underestimate them. For example, in 2020, the McKinsey Global Institute modeled expected changes in flooding due to climate change in Bristol, England . A cluster of major corporate headquarters was not directly affected, but the transportation arteries to and from the area were. The water may never enter the lobby of the building, but neither will the tenants.

The climate transition will affect both individual buildings and entire real-estate markets

The investments required to avoid or derisk the worst physical risks will drive a historic reallocation of capital . This will change the structure of our economy and impact the value of the markets, companies, and companies’ locations. These momentous changes require real-estate players to look ahead for regulatory, economic, and social changes that could impact assets.

Among the most direct climate-transition impacts are regulatory requirements to decarbonize buildings, such as New York City’s Local Law 97. In June 2019, the Urban Green Council found that retrofitting all 50,000 buildings covered by the law would create retrofit demand of up to $24.3 billion through 2030. 4 Justin Gerdes, “After pandemic, New York’s buildings face daunting decarbonization mandate,” Greentech Media, April 23, 2020. Standard property valuation models generally do not account for the capital costs required for a building to decarbonize, and investors and operators are often left with a major capital expense or tax that wasn’t considered in the investment memo.

There is also a host of less direct but potentially more significant transition risks that affect whole markets. For example, some carbon-intensive industries are already experiencing rapid declines or fluctuations. In Calgary, for example, the combination of oil price volatility and market-access issues (driven by climate change–related opposition to pipelines) has dramatically depressed revenues from some buildings. Vacancy rates in downtown Calgary reached about 30 percent, a record high, as of January 2021. Investors exposed to the Calgary market have seen their asset values drop precipitously and are left trying to either hold on and hope for a reversal of fortunes or exit the assets and take a significant loss.

Real-estate players should build the capabilities to understand climate-related impacts on asset performance and values

Real-estate owners and investors will need to improve their climate intelligence to understand the potential impact of revenue, operating costs, capital costs, and capitalization rate on assets. This includes developing the analytical capabilities to consistently assess both physical and transition risks. Analyses should encompass both direct effects on assets and indirect effects on the markets, systems, and societies with which assets interact (Exhibit 1).

Portfolio and asset managers can map, quantify, and forecast climate change’s asset value impact

To understand climate change impact on asset values, landlords and investors can develop the following capabilities to understand and quantify risks and opportunities:

• Prioritize. Create a detailed assessment of the asset or portfolio to determine which physical and transition risks are most important and which are less important (using criteria such as the probability of a risk occurring or the severity of that risk).
• Map building exposures. Determine which buildings are exposed to risks, either directly (for example, having to pay a carbon tax on building emissions) or indirectly (for example, exposure to reduction in occupancy as tenants’ industries decline because of a carbon tax), and the degree of exposure (for example, how high floodwaters would reach). This could require detailed modeling of physical hazards (for example, projected changes in flood risks as the climate changes) or macro- or microeconomic modeling (for example, projected GDP impacts based on the carbon price impact on a local geography’s energy production mix).
• Quantify portfolio impact. Combine assessments of the economic risks on individual buildings into an impact map that enables visualization of the entire portfolio (Exhibit 2). This requires combining knowledge of the potential risk or opportunity and an understanding of what drives the economics of a building (including drivers of net operating income, tenancy mix, and areas of cost variability).
• Take action. These capabilities cannot be isolated in a research or environmental, social, and governance (ESG) function but should directly inform investment management, lease pricing, capital attraction and investor relations, asset management, tenant attraction, development, and other core businesses. The processes within organizations must shift to ensure that climate-related insights can be a source of real competitive advantage.

A portfolio revaluation informed by climate change risks can lead to hard choices but will also open the door to acting on decarbonization and exploring new opportunities.

Decarbonize buildings and portfolios

McKinsey research estimates approximately $9.2 trillion in annual investment will be required globally to support the net-zero transition . If the world successfully decarbonizes, the 2050 economy will look fundamentally different from the current economy. If it doesn’t successfully decarbonize, the world will experience mounting physical risks that will strain the foundations of the global economy and society. In either case, the places where people live, work, shop, and play will fundamentally change.

Decarbonizing real estate requires considering a building’s ecosystem

Ultimately, the only way to reduce the risks of climate change is to decarbonize. Real-estate players have a wide array of options for how to proceed, including low-carbon development and construction ; building retrofits to improve energy efficiency; upgrades to heating, cooling, and lighting technology; and technology to manage demand and consumption. But decarbonization is not solely a technical challenge. To develop the most appropriate path, real-estate players need to understand the range of decarbonization options and their financial and strategic costs and benefits.

Decarbonizing real estate

To decarbonize, industry players can take the following steps:

• Understand the starting point. Quantify baseline emissions of each building. This helps real-estate players prioritize where to start (for example, individual buildings, asset classes, or regions) and determine how far there is to go to reach zero emissions.
• Set targets. Decide which type of decarbonization target to set. There is a range of potential target-setting standards that take different approaches (for example, measuring absolute emissions versus emissions intensity, or setting targets at the sector level versus asset level). Players should develop a “house view” on targets that achieve business, investor, stakeholder, regulatory, and other objectives.
• Identify decarbonization levers. Build an asset- or portfolio-level abatement curve. A marginal abatement cost curve  provides a clear view of the potential cost/return on investment of a given emissions-reduction lever along with the impact of that lever on emissions reduction. This approach can be complemented with market and policy scenarios that change the relative costs and benefits of each potential abatement lever.
• Execute. Set up the mechanisms to effectively deploy the decarbonization plan. These may involve making changes to financing and governance, stakeholder engagement (investors, joint-venture partners, operators, and tenants), and a range of operational and risk-management aspects of the business.
• Track and improve. As investors, lenders, and tenants make their own decarbonization commitments, they will need to demonstrate that their real estate is indeed decarbonizing. Thus, much of the value of decarbonizing will come from the ability to demonstrate emissions reduction to potential stakeholders. Building the ability to monitor and progressively reduce emissions on the path to net zero will create an opportunity for players to differentiate.

Create new sources of value and revenue streams for investors, tenants, and communities

As the economy decarbonizes, real-estate players can use their locations, connections to utility systems, local operational footprints, and climate intelligence to create new revenue streams, improve asset values, or launch entirely new businesses.

Opportunities include the following:

• Local energy generation and storage. Real-estate firms can use their physical presence to generate and store energy. For example, property developers have been outfitting buildings with solar arrays and batteries, helping to stabilize energy grids and reduce the costs associated with clean energy. 5 “5 ways clean tech is making commercial RE more energy efficient,” Jones Lang LaSalle, April 20, 2021.
• Green buildings to attract more tenants. Developers and property managers can invest in developing green buildings or retrofitting older buildings to make them green to meet the growing appetite for sustainable workplaces and homes.
• Green-building materials. Players can explore the advantages of green steel, tall timber, modular construction, and other emerging technologies and materials that may have additional benefits, such as faster and lower-cost construction.
• Extra services on-site. Firms can introduce new revenue streams, including vehicle charging, green-facilities management, and other on-site services that enable occupants’ sustainable preferences.
• Services for reducing and tracking emissions. Firms can support occupants by tracking emissions and offering solutions to reduce carbon footprints. These services could include smart sensors and tracking energy consumption through heating, cooling, lighting, and space management.
• Differentiated capital attraction. Given the volume of capital that has already been committed to achieving net zero, firms that are able to decarbonize will have an advantage in attracting capital. Real-estate players may, for example, create specific funds for net-zero buildings or investment themes that support community-scale decarbonization.

The coming climate transition will create seismic shifts in the real-estate industry, changing tenants’ and investors’ demands, the value of individual assets, and the fundamental approaches to developing and operating real estate. Smart players will get ahead of these changes and build climate intelligence early by understanding the implications for asset values, finding opportunities to decarbonize, and creating opportunity through supporting the transition.

Real estate not only will play a critical role in determining whether the world successfully decarbonizes but also will continue to reinvent the way we live, work, and play through these profound physical and economic changes.

This article was edited by Katy McLaughlin, a senior editor in the southern California office.

Explore a career with us

Related articles.

Call for action: Seizing the decarbonization opportunity in construction

Glasgow COP26 2021: Decarbonizing the built environment

Virtual 2021: Sustainability in the construction ecosystem

Miss USA's resignation letter accuses the organization of toxic work culture

The Miss USA who gave up her crown and title this week accused the pageant’s CEO of failing to take an incident of sexual harassment seriously and creating a toxic work environment, according to a copy of her resignation letter obtained Thursday by NBC News.

“There is a toxic work environment within the Miss USA organization that, at best, is poor management and, at worst, is bullying and harassment,” Noelia Voigt wrote in the letter. “This started soon after winning the title of Miss USA 2023.”

Voigt announced Monday on Instagram that she was relinquishing her crown, citing her mental health. Two days later, Miss Teen USA UmaSofia Srivastava, 17, announced she was also stepping down in a statement that said her “personal values no longer fully align with the direction of the organization.”

Fans who were shocked by the unprecedented resignations noticed that the first letter in every sentence of Voigt’s online statement spelled out “ I am silenced .”

In her resignation letter, Voigt said that Miss USA CEO and President Laylah Rose consistently failed to communicate and that when she did, she was “often cold and unnecessarily aggressive.”

“It’s incredibly jarring to be trying to do my job and constantly be threatened with disciplinary action, including taking away my salary, for things that were never discussed with me and, if it related to a public-facing post for example, were causing no issue other than not meeting her personal preference,” Voigt wrote.

Representatives for the Miss USA organization did not immediately respond to request for comment Thursday evening.

Rose said in a statement Wednesday that “the well-being of all individuals associated with Miss USA is my top priority.”

“All along, my personal goal as the head of this organization has been to inspire women to always create new dreams, have the courage to explore it all, and continue to preserve integrity along the way. I hold myself to these same high standards and I take these allegations seriously,” she said.

Voigt included in her letter details about an alleged incident of sexual harassment at a Christmas event in Florida. She wrote that she was left alone in a car with a man who “made several inappropriate statements to me about his desire to enter into a relationship with me.”

Voigt said that when Rose was made aware of the situation, she told Voigt, “We cannot prevent people saying things to you at public appearances, it is, unfortunately, part of the role you’re in as a public figure.” 

Rose is also accused in the letter of badmouthing Voigt to others in the organization and painting her as “uninterested” in her job.

“I have heard that comments have ranged from her describing me as difficult to work with for various untrue reasons, to weaponizing my mental health struggles brought on by my experience as Miss USA 2023, calling me ‘mentally ill’ in a derogatory way, to expressing that she hoped I would get hit in the face by a baseball at an event where I would throw out the first pitch at a baseball game,” Voigt wrote in her letter.

Despite the environment, Voigt said, she was committed to the Miss USA brand, but her mental and physical health continued to erode.

“I am now diagnosed with Anxiety and have to take two medications daily to manage the symptoms due to consistently being on edge, worrying about what Laylah will pop up with and choose to harass me about daily,” the letter said.

She wrote that she had flare-ups of a pre-existing condition that is worsened by stress and that she is experiencing “heart palpitations, full body shakes, loss of appetite, unintentional weight loss, loss of sleep, loss of hair, and more.”

Voigt cited a toxic work environment at Miss USA that she said is unsafe for future Miss Universe Organization title holders.

“Every statement you have ever put out about MUO’s morals and integrity directly contradicts what is happening within the USA organization,” the letter said.

Claudia Michelle, a former social media manager who said she submitted her resignation last week, echoed similar sentiments about Miss USA management in an interview with NBC News on Thursday.

“Leaders in women’s empowerment organizations need to be held accountable,” Michelle said. “How do you not take the mental health of the face of your brand seriously?”

Michelle said she was aware that Voigt had raised concerns over her safety and traveling alone and that she began to travel more with Miss USA in March and April.

Michelle said that Rose was inconsistent with her communication and that the organization’s management was unprofessional.

Brittany Lane is a booker for NBC News.

Doha Madani is a senior breaking news reporter for NBC News. Pronouns: she/her.