Including people with learning disabilities in conversations about climate change

Background: People with learning disabilities may be disproportionately affected by the consequences of climate change, yet their perspectives are almost entirely absent from climate research and discourse. Aim: This study explored the perspectives of people with learning disabilities on climate change, including their understanding of it and whether and how they wished to be involved in conversations and actions to address it. Methods: Fourteen adults with learning disabilities were recruited from a community day centre in East England and took part in individual semi-structured interviews. Nine participants subsequently attended an informal feedback group in which the findings were shared and discussed. Data from the interviews were analysed using Braun and Clarke's (2006) reflexive thematic analysis, generating two overarching themes and six subordinate themes. Results: The first theme, Understanding Climate Change, identified a spectrum of understanding ranging from little to no familiarity with the concept, through weather-based associations, to a more complex and comprehensive awareness of its human causes and global consequences. The second theme, Inaccessible Climate Change, explored the structural, communicative, and attitudinal barriers that have prevented people with learning disabilities from accessing climate information and participating in climate discourse, and examined participants' own reflections on why they have been excluded from these conversations. Conclusion: The findings challenge deficit-based assumptions about the capacity of people with learning disabilities to engage with climate change and support a social model interpretation in which the barriers to engagement are located in systems and structures rather than in individuals. The study argues that the inclusion of people with learning disabilities in climate conversations is not only practically possible but ethically necessary, and that their voices and perspectives have both the right and the capacity to contribute to one of the most significant challenges of our time.