Ansible: references to `environment` object

example-task.yml

---
- debug: var=environment

output.md

Question Why is the following a list of dicts, rather than a dict?

ok: [default] => {
    "environment": [
        {
            "foo": "bar"
        }
    ]
}

Answer (From #ansible on freenode.irc.net)

(10:56:14 AM) lanky: jugglinmike: because that's how environment variables appear to be stored - converted to a list of dict, allows task and role environments to inherit playbook environments.

playbook.yml

---
- hosts: all
  roles:
  - example-task
  environment:
    foo: bar