IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v13y2021i2p493-d475984.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Challenge of Global Environmental Change: Attitudinal Trends in Teachers-In-Training

Author

Listed:
  • Mercedes Varela-Losada

    (Department of Special Didactics, University of Vigo, 36005 Pontevedra, Spain)

  • Pedro Vega-Marcote

    (Department of Pedagogy and Didactics, University of A Coruña, 15008 A Coruña, Spain)

  • María Lorenzo-Rial

    (Department of Special Didactics, University of Vigo, 36005 Pontevedra, Spain)

  • Uxío Pérez-Rodríguez

    (Department of Special Didactics, University of Vigo, 36005 Pontevedra, Spain)

Abstract

The aim of our research was to study attitudinal trends in Spanish trainee teachers regarding Global Environmental Change (GEC), in order to identify elements that should be enhanced in their education. The Scale of Global Environmental Change (SGEC) was used as a measurement instrument to explore attitudes on how to deal with GEC. A cluster analysis of the scores of the four SGEC factors (N = 950) was carried out in order to segment the cases into groups of similar response profiles. Two solutions are proposed: one made up of two clusters (Concerned and Disengaged) and the other of four clusters (Egocentric, Indifferent, Sceptical and Committed). Furthermore, we have analysed whether some of the students’ characteristics significantly influence their inclusion in one cluster or another. The results of this study show that among trainee teachers there are sceptical, self-centered and indifferent trends, which do not correspond to people capable of promoting the transformation needed to deal with GEC. Therefore, it is necessary to improve their training with new educational models that favour the recognition of the real origin of socio-environmental problems and provide them with skills to promote individual and social responsibility.

Suggested Citation

  • Mercedes Varela-Losada & Pedro Vega-Marcote & María Lorenzo-Rial & Uxío Pérez-Rodríguez, 2021. "The Challenge of Global Environmental Change: Attitudinal Trends in Teachers-In-Training," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(2), pages 1-19, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:13:y:2021:i:2:p:493-:d:475984
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/2/493/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/2/493/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Nelson, J.A., 2013. "Ethics and the economist: What climate change demands of us," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 85(C), pages 145-154.
    2. David HOLLANDERS, 2015. "The great divide: Unequal societies and what we can do about them. By Joseph E. STIGLITZ," International Labour Review, International Labour Organization, vol. 154(3), pages 415-416, September.
    3. Sandra Caeiro & Ulisses M. Azeiteiro, 2020. "Sustainability Assessment in Higher Education Institutions," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(8), pages 1-4, April.
    4. Gisela Cebrián & Mercè Junyent, 2015. "Competencies in Education for Sustainable Development: Exploring the Student Teachers’ Views," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 7(3), pages 1-19, March.
    5. Leire Agirreazkuenaga, 2019. "Embedding Sustainable Development Goals in Education. Teachers’ Perspective about Education for Sustainability in the Basque Autonomous Community," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(5), pages 1-17, March.
    6. So Young Kim & Yael Wolinsky-Nahmias, 2014. "Cross-National Public Opinion on Climate Change: The Effects of Affluence and Vulnerability," Global Environmental Politics, MIT Press, vol. 14(1), pages 79-106, February.
    7. Carly A. Phillips & Astrid Caldas & Rachel Cleetus & Kristina A. Dahl & Juan Declet-Barreto & Rachel Licker & L. Delta Merner & J. Pablo Ortiz-Partida & Alexandra L. Phelan & Erika Spanger-Siegfried &, 2020. "Compound climate risks in the COVID-19 pandemic," Nature Climate Change, Nature, vol. 10(7), pages 586-588, July.
    8. Iris Alkaher & Nurit Carmi, 2019. "Is Population Growth an Environmental Problem? Teachers’ Perceptions and Attitudes towards Including It in Their Teaching," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(7), pages 1-24, April.
    9. Pascal Frank & Laura Sophie Stanszus, 2019. "Transforming Consumer Behavior: Introducing Self-Inquiry-Based and Self-Experience-Based Learning for Building Personal Competencies for Sustainable Consumption," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(9), pages 1-19, May.
    10. Mohamed M. Mostafa, 2016. "Post-materialism, Religiosity, Political Orientation, Locus of Control and Concern for Global Warming: A Multilevel Analysis Across 40 Nations," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 128(3), pages 1273-1298, September.
    11. Sandra Caeiro & Leyla Angélica Sandoval Hamón & Rute Martins & Cecilia Elizabeth Bayas Aldaz, 2020. "Sustainability Assessment and Benchmarking in Higher Education Institutions—A Critical Reflection," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(2), pages 1-30, January.
    12. Mercedes Varela-Losada & Azucena Arias-Correa & Uxío Pérez-Rodríguez & Pedro Vega-Marcote, 2019. "How Can Teachers Be Encouraged to Commit to Sustainability? Evaluation of a Teacher-Training Experience in Spain," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(16), pages 1-12, August.
    13. Matthew B. Arbuckle & David M. Konisky, 2015. "The Role of Religion in Environmental Attitudes," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 96(5), pages 1244-1263, November.
    14. Sonja Maria Geiger & Daniel Fischer & Ulf Schrader, 2018. "Measuring What Matters in Sustainable Consumption: An Integrative Framework for the Selection of Relevant Behaviors," Sustainable Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 26(1), pages 18-33, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Noor Hamwy & Jennifer Bruder & Abdellatif Sellami & Michael H. Romanowski, 2023. "Challenges to Teachers Implementing Sustainable Development Goals Frameworks in Qatar," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(15), pages 1-19, July.
    2. José María Marcos-Merino & Isaac Corbacho-Cuello & Míriam Hernández-Barco, 2020. "Analysis of Sustainability Knowingness, Attitudes and Behavior of a Spanish Pre-Service Primary Teachers Sample," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(18), pages 1-22, September.
    3. Carolina Feliciana Machado & João Paulo Davim, 2022. "Higher Education for Sustainability: A Bibliometric Approach—What, Where and Who Is Doing Research in This Subject?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(8), pages 1-15, April.
    4. Sam Crawley & Hilde Coffé & Ralph Chapman, 2022. "Climate Belief and Issue Salience: Comparing Two Dimensions of Public Opinion on Climate Change in the EU," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 162(1), pages 307-325, July.
    5. Maryam Dilmaghani, 2018. "Which is greener: secularity or religiosity? Environmental philanthropy along religiosity spectrum," Environmental Economics and Policy Studies, Springer;Society for Environmental Economics and Policy Studies - SEEPS, vol. 20(2), pages 477-502, April.
    6. Céline Nauges & Sarah Ann Wheeler & Kelly S. Fielding, 2021. "The relationship between country and individual household wealth and climate change concern: the mediating role of control," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 23(11), pages 16481-16503, November.
    7. Amanda Kennard, 2021. "My Brother’s Keeper: Other-regarding preferences and concern for global climate change," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 16(2), pages 345-376, April.
    8. Muhammad Mohiuddin & Elahe Hosseini & Sedigheh Bagheri Faradonbeh & Mehdi Sabokro, 2022. "Achieving Human Resource Management Sustainability in Universities," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(2), pages 1-19, January.
    9. Filippos Eliades & Maria K. Doula & Iliana Papamichael & Ioannis Vardopoulos & Irene Voukkali & Antonis A. Zorpas, 2022. "Carving out a Niche in the Sustainability Confluence for Environmental Education Centers in Cyprus and Greece," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(14), pages 1-17, July.
    10. Rocío Valderrama-Hernández & Fermín Sánchez-Carracedo & Lucía Alcántara Rubio & Dolores Limón-Domínguez, 2019. "Methodology to Analyze the Effectiveness of ESD in a Higher Degree in Education. A Case Study," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(1), pages 1-27, December.
    11. Leire Guerenabarrena-Cortazar & Jon Olaskoaga-Larrauri & Ernesto Cilleruelo-Carrasco, 2021. "Integration of Sustainability in Engineering and Architectural Studies in Spanish Universities," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(14), pages 1-14, July.
    12. Walter Leal Filho & Mark Mifsud & Petra Molthan-Hill & Gustavo J. Nagy & Lucas Veiga Ávila & Amanda Lange Salvia, 2019. "Climate Change Scepticism at Universities: A Global Study," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(10), pages 1-13, May.
    13. Oscar Frausto-Martínez & Cesar Daniel Aguilar-Becerra & Orlando Colín-Olivares & Gabriel Sánchez-Rivera & Adel Hafsi & Alex Fernando Contreras-Tax & Wilberth David Uhu-Yam, 2020. "COVID-19, Storms, and Floods: Impacts of Tropical Storm Cristobal in the Western Sector of the Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(23), pages 1-17, November.
    14. Nijolė Burkšaitienė & Robert Lesčinskij & Jelena Suchanova & Jolita Šliogerienė, 2021. "Self-Directedness for Sustainable Learning in University Studies: Lithuanian Students’ Perspective," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(16), pages 1-15, August.
    15. Sung-Shun Weng & Yang Liu & Yen-Ching Chuang, 2019. "Reform of Chinese Universities in the Context of Sustainable Development: Teacher Evaluation and Improvement Based on Hybrid Multiple Criteria Decision-Making Model," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(19), pages 1-23, October.
    16. Hamish van der Ven & Yixian Sun, 2021. "Varieties of Crises: Comparing the Politics of COVID-19 and Climate Change," Global Environmental Politics, MIT Press, vol. 21(1), pages 13-22, Winter.
    17. Kifah Imara & Fahriye Altinay, 2021. "Integrating Education for Sustainable Development Competencies in Teacher Education," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(22), pages 1-17, November.
    18. Maria Victoria G. Violanda & Dennis V. Madrigal, 2021. "Education for Sustainable Development (ESD): A Journey Towards Sustainable Future," Technium Social Sciences Journal, Technium Science, vol. 20(1), pages 172-180, June.
    19. Eva-Maria Waltner & Werner Rieß & Christoph Mischo, 2019. "Development and Validation of an Instrument for Measuring Student Sustainability Competencies," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(6), pages 1-20, March.
    20. Patricia Esteve-Guirao & Mercedes Jaén García & Isabel Banos-González, 2019. "The Interdependences between Sustainability and Their Lifestyle That Pre-Service Teachers Establish When Addressing Socio-Ecological Problems," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(20), pages 1-18, October.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:13:y:2021:i:2:p:493-:d:475984. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.