UK Edition - Today's top story: One of the world's most important climate threats has an image problem View in browser

18 June 2026

UK Edition

The Conversation
 

Climate journalism has no shortage of striking images: burning forests, melting glaciers, flooded streets, oil rigs at sunset and so on. These might be visual cliches but I’m very guilty of using them myself. We use these images because they’re engaging and effective, after all.

But what happens when an environmental threat has no obvious visuals? Fionagh Thomson, a visual anthropologist at Durham University, writes about the possibility of key Atlantic currents slowing down and changing the weather across the world. As the action unfolds far below the waves, she writes, visual storytelling is much harder.

In Toy Story 5, released in UK cinemas this week, Woody and co are worried about being replaced by tablets and other digital devices. “Even Rex the toy dinosaur is worried about going extinct again”, write Amy Hughes and Liane Beretta de Azevedo, childhood behaviour experts at Sheffield Hallam University. They look at how to find the right balance between toys and tablets.

Meanwhile, if you suffer from travel anxiety like Tom Sykes of the University of Portsmouth, renowned philosophers and psychologists have some tips for you.

 

Will de Freitas

Environment + Energy Editor

 
The Atlantic offers little visible sign of what’s moving beneath the waves. Arno Ryser / unsplash

One of the world’s most important climate threats has an image problem

Fionagh Thomson, Durham University

A key current in the Atlantic may be slowing down. But changes deep below the waves don’t generate obvious visual narratives.

banhan chueatong/Shutterstock

Does screen time mean children are missing out on play?

Amy Hughes, Sheffield Hallam University; Liane Beretta de Azevedo, Sheffield Hallam University

Different play experiences may provide different developmental opportunities.

The Departure: Second Class by Abraham Solomon (1855). National Railway Museum

Travel anxiety: five tips from major thinkers to calm your nerves

Tom Sykes, University of Portsmouth

I’ve been researching the myriad triggers of travel anxiety, inspired by my own experience of Generalised Anxiety Disorder. These are my favourite tips.

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