How Are Students’ Pro-environmental Behaviors Formed? A Qualitative Content Analysis

Universities play an undeniable role in directing and explaining behavior patterns. This raises expectations from universities to institutionalize pro-environmental behaviors in their structure. It is so of crucial importance to identify factors affecting students’ pro-environmental behaviors as the most important human resources at universities. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to identify factors affecting students’ pro-environmental behaviors. The statistical population of this qualitative study was composed of agricultural students at Razi University, Kermanshah, Iran. According to the the research aim, the PRISMA flow-chart were used to refine and select the appropriate data. Data were analyzed by using NVivo10 software. Results show that students’ pro-environmental behavior is affected by 10 factors, the most important ones being values and norms, experiences, social capital, knowledge and awareness, university infrastructure, organizational culture, curriculum contents, self-efficacy, and concerns over environmental degradation. Cluster analysis shows that organizational culture and individual values influence all other factors that underpin students’ pro-environmental behaviors.