Assessing Undergraduate University Students' Level of Knowledge, Attitudes and Behaviour Towards Biodiversity: A case study in Cyprus

Nisiforou, Olympia; Charalambides, Alexandros G.

doi:10.1080/09500693.2011.637991

Cited by 38 publications

(37 citation statements)

References 41 publications

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“…One of the most important key concepts is biodiversity. However, people's understanding of biodiversity, and particularly the importance of biodiversity for sustainability, is often incomplete and includes misunderstandings [60][61][62][63]. In this study, and our previous study [29], most of the student teachers considered biodiversity to be important or very important for sustainable development, but many of them could not explain why.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 60%

“…Magntorn's idea in learning to 'read nature' [50] is that taxonomy can be linked to systems thinking via the autecology of the species (the ecological relationships of a particular plant or animal species). Although students do not understand the complexity of biodiversity, they do, according to another study [63], have positive attitudes towards it. Previous research emphasises the importance of the preparation of student teachers in biodiversity education [61,71].…”

Section: Biodiversity For Understanding Of Sustainabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…People's understanding of biodiversity, however, seems to have declined significantly during the past decades [60,62,63]. A global problem today is therefore that all three dimensions of biodiversity have been simplified and homogenised, while species extinction continues, mainly caused by human activities [64].…”

Section: Biodiversity For Understanding Of Sustainabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

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Systems Thinking for Understanding Sustainability? Nordic Student Teachers’ Views on the Relationship between Species Identification, Biodiversity and Sustainable Development

et al. 2017

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Sustainability is a complex concept including ecological, economic and social dimensions, which in turn involve several aspects that are interrelated in a complex way, such as cultural, health and political aspects. Systems thinking, which focuses on a system's interrelated parts, could therefore help people understand the complexity of sustainability. The aim of this study is to analyse student teachers' level of systems thinking regarding sustainability, especially the ecological dimension, and how they explain the relationship between species identification, biodiversity and sustainability. Nordic student teachers (N = 424) participated in a questionnaire and their open answers were content-analysed and categorised. The results indicate the student teachers' low level of systems thinking regarding ecological sustainability. About a quarter of them (25.4%) had a basic level including interconnections (13.7%), additional feedback (8.9%) and also behavioural aspects (2.8%), but none of them reached an intermediate or advanced level. The low level of systems thinking could be explained by two main factors: (1) Systems thinking has not been used as an educational method of developing understanding of sustainability in teacher education programmes; and (2) systems thinking is also a result of life experiences; the older ones showing more systems thinking than the younger ones. Therefore, elementary forms of systems thinking should be an educational method already in primary education.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 60%

Section: Biodiversity For Understanding Of Sustainabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Biodiversity For Understanding Of Sustainabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

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Systems Thinking for Understanding Sustainability? Nordic Student Teachers’ Views on the Relationship between Species Identification, Biodiversity and Sustainable Development

et al. 2017

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“…Nonetheless, the public's understanding of the importance of BD conservation seems to have declined significantly during the past decades [3,9]. In this sense, Hofman-Bergholm [12] (p. 7) suggested that a 'kind of ecological illiteracy has developed' among the population and, even, among university graduates.…”

Section: The Close Relationship Between Our Lifestyle and Sustainabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Nevertheless, different authors recognise as insufficient the support for this approach from public institutions [8,9]. Despite all the plans and policies in recent decades, some goals set for schools and higher education have not yet been reached [2,10].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Interdependences between Sustainability and Their Lifestyle That Pre-Service Teachers Establish When Addressing Socio-Ecological Problems

2019

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In the training of pre-service teachers, promoting changes in everyday activities to favour environmental conservation is still a challenge. This paper discusses the main difficulties of pre-service teachers in the process of building relationships between sustainability and their lifestyle. For this purpose, a problem-based learning programme was designed, consisting of three socio-ecological problems. In each of them, we analysed three components which define these interdependences: pressures, importance and solutions for conservation. There were 72 participants in the whole programme and 1296 responses were assessed, by establishing three levels of sophistication for the relationships between sustainability and their lifestyle in each component. The pre-service teachers readily admitted the pressures on the environment exerted by certain everyday activities. In addition, they progressed on the identification of the importance of ecosystem services in their lives, and they pay attention to those services linked to socio-economic and cultural activities. The greatest difficulties lay in proposing solutions of conservation that involve changes in personal habits towards more-sustainable ones. These difficulties are discussed, as well as the educational implications that may be derived.

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Assesing the knowledge, perception, and attitude of wildlife management students toward biodiversity conservation in Nigeria

Ajayi,

Coker,

Agbon

2024

Wildlife Letters

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Despite intensified media campaigns and heightened emphasis on classroom instruction, recent international research has reported that young people are still failing to acknowledge biodiversity conservation as an issue of high priority. This study assessed students' knowledge, perception, and attitude toward biodiversity conservation in three Federal Universities offering Wildlife Management course in Southwestern Nigeria. A total of 159 respondents (15% sampling intensity) were surveyed using a structured questionnaire between July and December 2021. The findings revealed that most students had low knowledge of biodiversity conservation. This result is quite shocking given that they were enrolled in wildlife management courses. On the other hand, they had favorable attitudes and perceptions. The result further revealed that students in University of Ibadan had better attitude and perception. We concluded that there is a need to develop and teach programs and curricula that encourage and sustain the interests of wildlife students in biodiversity conservation.

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Assessing Undergraduate University Students' Level of Knowledge, Attitudes and Behaviour Towards Biodiversity: A case study in Cyprus

Cited by 38 publications

References 41 publications

Systems Thinking for Understanding Sustainability? Nordic Student Teachers’ Views on the Relationship between Species Identification, Biodiversity and Sustainable Development

Systems Thinking for Understanding Sustainability? Nordic Student Teachers’ Views on the Relationship between Species Identification, Biodiversity and Sustainable Development

The Interdependences between Sustainability and Their Lifestyle That Pre-Service Teachers Establish When Addressing Socio-Ecological Problems

Assesing the knowledge, perception, and attitude of wildlife management students toward biodiversity conservation in Nigeria

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