Student Decision-making on Sustainability Dilemmas and its Relationship to Sustainability Consciousness

Author(s):

Teresa Berglund(presenting / submitting)Niklas Gericke

Conference:

ECER 2015

Network:

30. Environmental and Sustainability Education Research (ESER)

Format:

Paper

Session Information

30 SES 05 B, ESE Promoting Student's Abilities

Paper Session

Time:

2015-09-09

11:00-12:30

Room:

105.Oktatóterem [C]

Chair:

Marco Rieckmann

Contribution

The concept of sustainable development (SD) is based on the idea that economic and social development should be connected to the environment. However, there are frequently disagreements about specific environmental, economic or social goals, and sometimes also conflicts between environmental, economic and social objectives. In everyday life, conflicts can arise due to people’s different interpretations, value-judgments and views of the optimal solutions for developmental and environmental problems. The divergence among perspectives that might exist among people in this regard has been discussed in research as a resource in the learning process (see for example Wals 2011; Lundegård and Wickman 2007). Highlighting different opinions can facilitate the awareness among students about the roots to difficulties associated with achieving SD and enhance their ability to deal with alternative opinions in a constructive way. A role of education for sustainable development (ESD) as discussed by Mogensen and Schnack (2010) is to develop action competence among students, relating to their ability, motivation and desire to play an active role in the search for democratic solutions to SD problems.

The aim of this study is to investigate the divergence in student perspectives concerning SD and its underpinning dimensions. The study investigates the decision-making among students in a number of sustainability dilemmas and if their decisions are influenced by environmental, economic and social considerations. The investigation is based on a survey conducted among 18-19 year old students in upper secondary schools in Sweden.

The research questions addressed in this study are:

To what extent are environmental, economic and social dimensions of SD prioritized in students’ decisions in a number of sustainability dilemmas?

How can students’ decision-making be related to their sustainability consciousness?

Method

The first part of the questionnaire was designed to probe students’ knowingness, attitudes and behaviors (KAB) in connection to environmental, economic and social dimensions of SD. This part of the questionnaire originated from a recently developed questionnaire measuring knowledge, attitudes and behaviors connected to SD (Michalos et al. 2011, 2012). We further developed the instrument to adapt it to a Swedish context and in this process, some items were deleted, some added and many revised. In this section, the respondents mark their level of agreement in a five-point Likert scale, ranging from Strongly disagree to Strongly agree. A Don’t know option was also available for each item. This part of the survey instrument consists of a total of 50 items merged together in the composite notion of sustainability consciousness. The definition of environmental, economic and social dimensions of SD that the survey instrument is based on originates from descriptions of the 15 sub-themes underlying the environmental, economic and social dimensions as outlined by UNESCO (2006, 18-21). The definition of ESD in Swedish curricula is closely related to the UNESCO definitions (Borg et al. 2014). Each item in the questionnaire relates to one of these sub-themes. In the second part of the questionnaire, three different scenarios were introduced to the students. The scenarios concerned 1) Grocery shopping, 2) Global warming, and 3) Disposal of waste products. For each scenario, two reasons were provided from each one of the environmental, economic and social dimensions, thus six reasons in total for each scenario, all mixed in order. The respondents were asked to indicate the most important reason for each scenario. The respondent needs to select and de-select among the reasons and consequently among the dimensions, and as a result, a conflict of interest might arise. Thus, the scores for choices connected to each dimension should reflect their perceived relative importance. After piloting, the questionnaire was distributed to students attending the final year on Science- or Social science programs in 15 upper secondary schools scattered across Sweden. A total of 638 student responses were analyzed and compared in the analysis process. After performing factor analysis and reliability tests, comparisons of different groups were made. All analyses were carried out using SPSS Statistics version 20. Multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was used to analyze differences between sub-groups in the data corresponding to the second research question.

Expected Outcomes

Environmental perspectives predominate in students’ priorities; however, in the grocery store economic perspectives are the most important (selected by 54.1% of the students), followed by environmental (32.3%) and social perspectives (13.6%). Environmental aspects are perceived as the most important reasons for braking global warming (selected by 45% of the students), then followed by social (38.3%) and economic aspects (16.8%). Environmental reasons strongly predominate for sustainable disposal of waste (selected by 74.3% of the students). Only a small proportion chose social or economic reasons for taking action in this regard (14.6% and 11.1% respectively). The respondents were divided into three groups based on their decisions on the sustainability dilemmas: students choosing 1) environmental reasons (311 students), 2) economic reasons (102 students), and 3) social reasons (73 students), as most important at least twice for the three scenarios. Subsequently, the sustainability consciousness for each group was analyzed and compared. Results show that students who prioritize environmental reasons in their decisions indicated higher mean values for the KAB-items in the environmental, economic and social dimensions of SD than other students. Thus, they are characterized by a higher sustainability consciousness as defined in this study. The students who prioritize economic reasons in their decisions have lower mean values in all three SD dimensions, and are thus characterized by a lower sustainability consciousness than other students (p<0.05). No significant differences are found between students prioritizing social reasons and others. Conclusively, environmental perspectives predominate the overall pattern; however, different dimensions are prioritized in different contexts. Our results suggest that increased consciousness about SD is associated with a shift in students’ decisions from an economic to an environmental basis. Those who have developed a strong sustainability consciousness, i.e. are more cognitively and affectively aware of SD, are most likely to favor environmental perspectives over economic perspectives.

References

Borg, C., Gericke, N., Höglund, H-O., and Bergman, E. (2014). Subject- and experience-bound differences in teachers' conceptual understanding of sustainable development. Environmental Education Research 20(4), 526-551. Lundegård, I., and Wickman, P-O. (2007). Conflicts of interest: an indispensable element of education for sustainable development. Environmental Education Research 13(1), 1-15. Michalos, A. C., Creech, H., McDonald, C., and Hatch Kahlke, P.M. (2011). Knowledge, attitudes and behaviours. Concerning education for sustainable development: Two exploratory studies. Social Indicators Research 100, 391-413. Michalos, A. C., Creech, H., Swayze, N., Kahlke, P. M., Buckler, C., and Rempel, K. (2012). Measuring knowledge, attitudes and behaviours concerning sustainable development among tenth grade students in Manitoba. Social Indicators Research 106(2), 213-238. Mogensen, F., and Schnack, K. (2010). The action competence approach and the ‘new’ discourses of education for sustainable development, competence and quality criteria. Environmental Education Research 16(1), 59-74. UNESCO. (2006). Framework for the UNDESD International Implementation Scheme. Paris: UNESCO. Wals, A. E. J. (2011). Learning our way to sustainability. Journal of Education for Sustainable Development 5(2), 177-186.

Author Information

Teresa Berglund (presenting / submitting)

Karlstad University

Department of Environmental and Life Sciences

Karlstad

Niklas Gericke

Karlstad University, Sweden

Search the ECER Programme

Search for keywords and phrases in "Text Search"
Restrict in which part of the abstracts to search in "Where to search"
Search for authors and in the respective field.
For planning your conference attendance you may want to use the conference app, which will be issued some weeks before the conference
If you are a session chair, best look up your chairing duties in the conference system (Conftool) or the app.