"The oneness IAT as a new assessment tool for sustainability research" led by Salomé Areias with Antje Disterheft, myself & Daniel Fischer

This study addresses a longstanding methodological gap in #sustainability and #environmentalpsychology research: the reliable measurement of oneness — understood as a sense of profound unity with all existence — and its potential role in motivating #pro-environmental behaviour.

Drawing on environmental psychology and psychoanalysis, the paper develops and validates a novel Implicit Association Test (IAT) designed to capture implicit associations with oneness, moving beyond the limitations of traditional self-report methods. The study was conducted in two phases, encompassing pilot testing (n=31) and psychometric validation (n=92), with results demonstrating strong internal consistency and significant correlations with established oneness and environmental attitude measures.

This work contributes to expanding the methodological toolkit available to researchers working at the intersection of sustainability science, psychology, and inner transformation — and opens new pathways for exploring how a redefined sense of self may underpin more systemic responses to the #climatecrisis.