Water, anxiety, and the human niche: a study in Southern Province, Zambia
2020
Marcantonio, Richard A.
Water (in)security is increasingly recognized as a global threat driven by population increase, water (mis)management, and global climate change. This is particularly true for Sub-Saharan Africa where the impacts of climate change are expected to negatively affect water access and availability. Projected increases in the frequency and intensity of droughts and floods and their potential impact on agriculture and water resources are especially worrisome. It is critical to understand how water disturbances are driving local level ecological changes – and the processes of adaptation undertaken by individuals and communities responding to these changes – to develop sustainable pathways through the global climate change landscape. Here I place local level nuances and processes at centre, using a niche construction heuristic framework and household level surveys (N = 224) to investigate locally relevant responses to water scarcity, with specific attention paid to social, psychosocial, and physical health impacts arising from anxiety about water. The findings here indicate that the anthroecological system in Choma – specifically the human-water subsystem – is internalizing negative impacts driven by water variations. Experienced anxieties from water issues have been shown to be strongly linked to household water needs not being met, time investments required for fetching water, suspected waterborne sickness, and household size.
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