Heatwave Monitor 2025
Croatia
Methodology
To conduct our analysis, 1500 people from Hungary, Croatia and Greece (500 per country) were surveyed using our responsive heatwave monitor in days during and following heatwaves during July 2025. The participants, aged 18 and above, are a representative sample of each country’s population. They answered 23 questions: five focused on demographics, while the remaining 18 explored emotions and agency in recent weeks. This helped us assess the impact of recent heatwaves in comparison to benchmark data from our Anger and Agency Monitor.
The data is visualized in an interactive analytics dashboard, enabling us to identify correlations and uncover trends for deeper analysis. Based on these insights, our team develops evidence-based recommendations to share with our partners, helping them enhance their climate communication strategies effectively.
Country Average
Heatwave Impact
37% of Croatians were highly impacted by the recent heatwaves. This is middle impact in SEE which seems to be relatively proportional to the frequency and intensity of the heatwaves experienced across these 3 countries.
Heatwaves are perceived as a future threat but the majority 41% believe that other threats are more important. 37% see it as a serious threat. Only 10% see it as an inconvenience substantially less than the 18% in full climate denial (AAM data).
Heatwave Severity - Future Outlook
Main Impact area
The ranking of main areas of impact is identical in all countries, with health leading and emotional wellbeing second. This homogeneous response shows that health impacts are the dominant narrative on heatwaves.
Economic impacts in contrast only factor in for those that experiencing it as a major impact . In Croatia this is lowest with only 8%. In contrast about 52% experience increase in electricity bills.
Despite other people acting mindlessly and other people should be more supporting being the main anger cause of anger in Croatia trust in other people is seen as the area that is impacted least.
Greatest Financial Impact
Heat and cooling cost mitigation
Emotions
In comparison with the other countries Croatia scores high on exhaustion, happiness, hope and being loved.
From October emotions improved slightly with a reduction in anger and worry and an increase of hope.
Causes of Anger
55% of Croatians believe that other people act mindlessly and worsen the problem, which is the highest in SEE.
43% feel that other people don’t provide sufficient support during the heatwave.
Croatians feel the most that heatwaves cause them to become exhausted and lose their temper of any of the countries in SEE (37%), while they are also the biggest believers that the heatwaves could have been avoided (28%).
Nevertheless more than two thirds believe in an inevitability of heatwaves.
Blame
Croatians have the most blame of any of the countries interviewed, and the most of their blame is directed at the economic elites (54%). Such prominent ranking often indicates an existing anti economic elite narrative in the public.
In a close second they blame other countries for the heatwaves (52%), and third the fossil fuel industry - both the highest blame for these parties in SEE as well.
Perception of Heatwave Adaptation
54% of Croatians feel that the government will fail to prepare for the next heatwave, which matches Hungary in this belief.
56% believe individuals should adapt, and 31% believe that individuals can adapt. This major discrepancy with 25% is slightly higher than in Hungary 22% but lower than in Greece 40%.
51.5% believe communities should adapt, and 20% believe that communities can adapt.
The believe in the potential of communities to adopt is not only the lowest in SEE it the discrepancy to the need with 32% is almost as high as in Greece 36%.
Motivation to get Involved
Like other countries in SEE, Croatians primarily want to know how their efforts would make a difference.
The second highest motivator to get involved was being provided with more information on where and when to get involved which was the highest in SEE.
Third was having more free time.
Social Capital
Croatian rank in the middle between Greece and Hungary when it comes to all three levels of social capital.
Empowerment and Mindset
Croatian report significantly more personal power and significantly less political power than the other two countries. This follow a trend that political power decreased and personal power increased from October 2024 to July 2025.
Croatia shows the lowest rate of precarious people in October due to a massive drop of this group from 45% to 26%. Even more surprising that this shift has increased the abundance mindset to 51%. (given constant news of trade wars and geopolitical tension it rebouncing abundance mindset is very surprising)
Impact Levels
Impact Demographic
Croatia and Hungary have the same amount of not impacted people but Croatia has higher numbers of highly impacted people at 37% compared to 29% in Hungary. Still way lower numbers than Greece at 52%
Demographic relations
The highly impacted show no clear correlation to wealth perception or income groups.
They show a higher proportion of women and older Generations.
They rely more than others only on fans but have a only 4% compared to 12 percent of impacted (no cooling systems at all)
They have a higher share in Towns, work less in offices
Emotions - Impact of Heatwave
There is a strong linear relationship between impact of the heatwave and negative emotions experienced.
Similarly, positive emotions were the highest in those not impacted, and lowest in those highly impacted besides Hope, which was lowest in those somewhat impacted.
What triggers Anger
Being highly impacted by anger increases the proportion of people that are triggered by certain issues. While only one cause (mindless people) causes half the somewhat impacted to be angry and none for not impacted for highly impacted people 5 reasons do.
Being exhausted and feeling powerless of low importance for other groups but factor in high for the highly impacted.
Mitigating heat and cooling costs
⅔ of impacted see their cooling costs increase this is significantly more than somewhat impact with 50% and not impacted with 29%.
Therefore the significantly more highly impacted take action to mitigate these costs. 60% limit the number of rooms they cooled. 51% had to limit their cooling use altogether due to economic implications.
Surprising is the relatively low use of public cooling spaces as mitigation strategy.
Social Capital
Those in metropolitan areas saw average levels of social capital, though their linking capital was 3% lower than rural folks, and bonding capital 7% lower.
Citizens living in towns saw the highest levels of bridging and linking capital.
Across SEE this pattern varied based on region and country.
Social Capital
There was a trend between impact of heatwave, and increased social capital.
Those that were highly impacted experienced 12% more linking capital than those that weren’t impacted.
Bridging capital was 1.5% higher in the impacted, although all impact levels were similar.
Bonding capital was relatively similar as well, with those most impacted showing 1% more than those not impacted.
Social capital and adaptation
People with low social capital see significant lower need and capacity of individuals and communities to adopt to the heat. While at low level they trust twice as much in the individual than the community adoptive capacity.
Those with medium social capital have significantly higher levels of need and capacities of individuals and communities to adopt. With a slight preference for the need of communities and a slightly stronger belief in the capacity of individuals.
Those with the highest levels of show significantly lower levels in the need of communities but only slightly lower levels on the capacity of communities. Those with high bonding capital even believe more in the capacity of communities than medium ones.
Those with high social capital believe almost twice as much in the capacity of communities than in that of individuals.
Barriers to Engagement
The lack of different types of agency are the main reasons that hold people back to engage.
More highly impacted people perceive lack of agency as a barrier to their involvement.
For highly and somewhat impacted individuals lack of information and that their action makes a difference are the main barriers. Having more time is the third reason.
For the not impacted it is having more time first the the information and being given resources to learn skills second.
Power and Mindset
In Croatia personal and political power drop significantly with increased impact.
The wealth distribution mindset is not impacted by the rate of impact in contrast to the two other countries.
Gender
Heatwave Impact & Gender
Women were 9.5% more likely to be highly impacted by the heatwaves in Croatia than men.
The increased level of high impact is similar to the other SEE countries.
Future Threat
The perception of the future threat potential of heatwaves is significantly different between men and women.
Almost twice as many women than men see heatwaves a major threat 47% to 26%.
While 10% more men believe that we have bigger problems.
15% of men believe that heatwaves will only be an inconvenience will this is only 5% in women.
Emotions
Women show higher levels of negative emotional experiences in Croatia than men.
Positive experiences like Hope and Happiness are more experienced by men. Only the feeling of being loved is is higher in women.
For women most emotions have been stable since Oct. 24. Only Anger is going down and hope is going up.
For men Anger and Worry is going down, while happiness has increased significantly. Also hope and exhaustion show a small increase.
The dramatic negative trends for heatwave impacted people are hidden as the proportion of highly impacted people is small.
Be aware that in this graph July is second for women and first for men so trends need to be read the other way around.
Anger Trigger
More Women are reacting to all anger triggers then men.
Especially anger due to the feeling of powerlessness and Anger due to the feeling of exhaustion are more common in women than in men.
Financial Impacts & Gender
While both Men and Women agree the biggest financial impact was electricity bill, Women were impacted harder in this field (Women 60%, Men 45%). Overall, Women experienced higher impacts to finances. The second highest cost for Croatian Women was other heat-related expenses, while third was groceries. Men also ranked these expenses in the top 3, but over 10% less experienced these impacts.
Barriers to get engaged
More women see barriers for engagement then men. They are mainly doubts in their agency. They request to see that their engagement is impactful, get more information and learn new skills.
Men feel less constrained but the reasons are also largely agency related. Only their second reason having more time is not agency related.
More motivational reasons like feeling responsible or being asked by a community member do not make it into the top 5 barriers.
Social capital
Minor differences in social capital between Gender with men having 1-2% more
Power and Mindset
Women have significantly less power than men (personal and political) in Croatia.
Both genders show a positive trend with both types of power increasing from Oct. 24 to July 25.
Women have a higher competitive scarcity mindset then men and a low fair distribution.
Both Genders follow the general trend of a shifting from Scarcity to abundance but the drop that women show if bigger than that of men.
Generation
Demographic anomalies
Impact
In Croatia Gen Z and Older Generations feel most impacted by the crisis while millennials 20% lower levels. With higher impact experiences more people from older generations also see heatwaves a serious threat, with Millennials having the lowest share in this category. The proportion of people that only sees heatwaves as an inconvenience is with 9-12% similar in all Generations.
Older generations feel significantly more impacted then the other two when they are doing errant and at home. Gen Z and Millennials show higher values on the commute.
Three factors are strongly correlated, old people and Millennials are mainly working at home, they are more highly impacted than Millennials. Impact is therefore mainly at home as all generations but especially old people mainly suffering when doing errants. Millenials on the other hand mainly work in offices, impact on commutes is lesser, Millennials feel less impacted.
Impact Areas
There are almost no differences in which area is most impact by heat between Generations.
Mitigating Heat and Cooling Costs
Spending more money on cooling, and limiting the numbers of rooms that are cooled rank in the top three for all generations.
Especially for Gen Z but also for Millennials spending time in cooled public Spaces is important though it migh not solely reflect a cost mitigation but a lifestyle choice. This option is not relevant for older generations.
Older Generations limit overall cooling
Emotions
With age exhaustion, happiness and anger are going down.
Between July and October Gen Z has seen a strong increase in negative feelings especially in Exhaustion and worry. But also Happiness and Love going up while hope is going down.
For Millennials all negative emotion are going down, while hope and happiness are going up. Only the feeling of getting loved is slightly decreasing.
For older Generations the emotional situation is more stable with small declines in most feelings only Anger is going up a bit.
Blame
Older Generations exhibit the highest levels of blame, with more than 10% more blaming the top three issues than the other two generation.
The top three entities to blame in each generation differ only marginally in their percentage.
Other countries and economic elites are top ranking in all three generational groups.
Millennials stick out mentioning Political elites as their top entity to blame. For the other two it is fossil fuel companies.
Adaptation
Old Generations at 57% have the highest share of people believing that the Government will fail to protect them from heatwaves followed by Gen Z 53% and Millennials at 48%.
While older generations see the highest necessity for individuals and communities to adopt, they are the generation that believes least that they can do so. For individuals they drop form 61 to 27% and for communities from 57 to 18%.
Gen Z has the highest believes in the adaptive capacity.
All generations have far less trust in the adaptive capacity of communities than in that of Individuals: Gen Z -14%, Millennials -13% and Older Generations -9%
Social Capital
Gen Z report the highest Social Capital in all Types but stick out on Bonding capital, with 25% showing they have this.
While all generations have similar levels on Bridging Capital, Older Generations drop significantly on Linking Capital.
Linking capital indicates the connection someone has with a person or group that has an elevated level of power and influence in or outside of their community.
Bridging Capital indicates a connection to groups of people that share functions or special interests (sports clubs, parent council) but not necessarily similar values.
Bonding Capital indicates the level of connections that people have with those who share similar values and worldviews.
Barriers to engagement
For Gen Z and Millennials a lot of agency related reasons are the main barrier to engagement:
The only exception is having more time.
Older Generations what to apply their skills.
Motivational reasons like being as by the community or feeling responsible are less relevant.
Power and Mindsets
For Gen Z political Power has increased and personal power remained the same making them now the Group that feels by far most politically empowered. +6% while old Generations have an political empowerment value from -27% (an extreme perception rift for a country).
Millennials have seen a strong increase of personal power and now are at the highest level of personal power for all groups. Also their political power slightly increased.
Also older generations increased their personal power but their political power already low, further dropped.
As in October the percentage of competitive scarcity increases with age. Though all show a major drop and an increase in abundance mindset.
Rural / Urban
Impact
Towns 44% stick out with feeling the most impacted in Croatia while the other three areas show similar values. (increasing from 32% in Metro to 36% in rural areas)
Cities are also the only area where more people see heat as a serious threat while other areas see it as a threat but see other issues more important.
Impact areas
Health is for all the highest impact areas followed by mental wellbeing in towns and while in all three other regions security is the second highest impact area. Other areas are below 10%,
Emotions
Cities and Metros are more hopeful than towns and rural, while rural area are the happiest.
Worry and Exhaustion are lowest in cities and highest in towns.
Also emotional trends vary considerably between regions. Rural areas stick out with a strong decrease in anger and an increase in Happyness.
While in Towns Exhaustion, worry, and powerlessness went up while anger decreases and positive feelings are stable.
In Cities Powerlessness and Worry drop significantly while happiness goes up. And decreases in worry and anger while exhaustion is slightly increasing.
Meteors see steep increases in hope some in happiness and
Area of impact and cooling
Rural areas rely less on AC with higher proportions of people who have no access to cooking (13%) and fans (23%)
In all areas most people feel affected during doing errands For rural the second highest is at work while for Metros and Cities it is at the commute.
For Cities and towns second highest is home (for cities together with commute).
Adaptation
Metros have the least trust in the government and see the second highest and highest need for individual therefore to step up and adopt, But they also see the lowest capacity for individuals. Less than half of the people that think individuals need to act belief in their capacity to do so. For individuals this is even less than a third, with only 15% believing that they have the ability too.
On the other side of the spectrum are rural populations with an 18% higher trust in the government and therefore lower need for communities and individuals to step up. Also their potential trust in the capacity of individuals with 35% is high, but trust in communities adaptive capacity also drops to 23%
Towns and Cities are in the middle ground with downs showing the highest need of all to step up.
Social capital
Social capital various little between regions.
Metros stick out with the lowest linking capital
While Towns have the highest linking and bridging capital, rural has the highest bonding capital.
Power and Mindsets
People in towns felt already in Oct. 24 most powerless politically and personally. In Feb. they felt even more powerless creating an even bigger distance between them and other regions.
All other regions see a strong increase in personal power and rural also in political power. For cities the political power is slightly declining.
The peculiar shift from scarcity to abundance mindset is reflected in all regions.
Precarious
Precarious share
The perceived wealth group distribution in Croatia shows a 4% decline of precarious and a 5% increase of stable between October 24 and July 25.
The group of people that see themselves as prosperous is bigger than in the other SEE countries
Impact
Precarious feel the most impacted while stable the least with a 10% difference between the two.
As in Greece and Hungary where the majority of precarious see heatwaves as a serious future threat while the majority of stable and prosperous see it as a threat but consider other problems more important. This is extremely evident in the stable group.
The Prosperous have significantly more people 15% compared to 9% in the other two groups that believe heatwaves are just an inconvenience. This is nevertheless significantly lower than the 27% of prosperous that classify as holding full climate denial in the country (data from AAM Oct. 24)
Emotions - Impact of Perceived Wealth Development
Higher positive emotions are seen in Croatia for those that consider their wealth development to be Prosperous, over the Precarious.
The Precarious group also experiences the highest levels of all negative emotions.
The Prosperous group’s negative emotions closely matched that of the Stable group.
Causes of Anger
The Precarious population are the biggest believers that people act mindlessly and worsen the heatwave problem, and also believe that others don’t provide sufficient support.
They also more triggered by exhaustion and the feeling of powerlessness than the other groups.
Social Capital
The prosperous are standing out with significant higher levels of social capital than the other two groups especially 11% more bonding, 6% more bridging and 12% more linking capital.
Stable and Precarious score similar on bonding and Linking but stable are slightly higher on Bridging capital.
Power and Mindset
Precarious have by far the lowest perceived power. While their personal power slightly improved, their political power further degraded.
Stable and Prosperous see both powers improve from Oct. 24 to Feb. 25 with Prosperous having significantly higher levels of power.
The extreme drop in competitive scarcity mindset in the country is mainly due to a massive decrease in this mindset by precarious. While the other two groups also decrease.
The high increase in abundance is dues to significant shifts in all wealth groups
Workplace, Home cooling
House Cooling
AC use in Croatia (72%) is similar to that is Greece 77% Also the percentage of people that have no access to cooling (9%) and only use fans 20% are only slightly higher than in Greece.
While Croatia is yet less impacted the individual cooling infrastructure is almost as advanced as in Greece.
Impact Level & Cooling Method
In Croatia, those working in an office or other building that are only exposed to the outside during their commute are the least impacted by the heatwave (28%) while those working outdoors for more than 4 hours a day are the most impacted (46%).
Impact Level & Cooling Method
In Croatia those most impacted by the heatwave were people that use fans as a primary method of cooling their home (45%). The least impacted were those that don’t have a cooling method at home.
In Croatia, like the rest of SEE, doing daily errands is the most impacted activity, with 36% of the population saying they were highly impacted when doing this.
Heat demographics - Most impacted life activity
The type of work environment plays a role.
Older generations were much more impacted than younger when doing errands, with 44.5% of older generations stating this was where they’re most impacted versus 30% for Millennials and Gen Z. For Millennials and Gen Z, commute was also impacted, but for Older Generations the second hardest hit was at home.
Those that have neither AC or fans were almost equally impacted at home versus doing errands (27% vs 29.5%). For all other home cooling types, the biggest impact was while doing errands.