Green Awareness in Action—How Energy Conservation Action Forces on Environmental Knowledge, Values and Behaviour in Adolescents’ School Life

Abstract

Affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy consumption is a crucial goal of the Agenda 2030. To raise each citizen’s awareness for more effective energy consumptions, proper education is necessary. The classroom project GAIA (Green Awareness in Action) was designed to change energy consumption patterns to pursue green behaviour. The class-wise aim was to improve schools’ CO2-balance and to promote environmentally sustainable behaviour without impacting school life quality. Our target group were sixth graders (N = 132, M = 11.03, SD ± 0.23, 53.4% = girls) of one Greek school. To monitor the project’s effect, a pre- and post-test design was applied to measure environmental literacy regarding environmental knowledge, attitudes/values and behaviour. A regression analysis revealed that students with poor previous knowledge reached higher learning effects compared to those with good previous knowledge. Related to the environmental knowledge types, an ANCOVA analysis revealed a knowledge gain in action-related and effectiveness knowledge. The overall learning effect correlates positively with pro-environmental preference (high scores in preservation, low scores in utilisation) and negatively with weak pro-environmental preferences. Anthropocentric (utilitarian) preferences primarily focussing on nature exploitation have considerably decreased. The project illustrates how far individual behaviour can be targeted in green educational initiatives.

COVID-19 and lockdown schooling: how digital learning environments influence semantic structures and sustainability knowledge

“…Several studies have demonstrated that environmentally friendly lifestyles depend on three key factors: knowledge, values, and behavior [10][11][12]. More precisely, high environmental knowledge scores positively influence pro-environmental attitudes and behaviors [13,14]. Consequently, establishing in-depth sustainability knowledge will motivate learners to live a more sustainable lifestyle.…”

Attitude toward and Awareness of Renewable Energy Sources: Hungarian Experience and Special Features

“…This means that, in order to gain a broader knowledge of renewable energy sources, it is necessary to teach these topics from primary school to university [22]. The fact that related knowledge can be influenced by the education of the head of the household suggests that a more informed current generation can positively influence future generations, while this finding also proves the positive impact and importance of lifelong learning and adult education [39,40]. (5) Occupation and interest in the environment, in technology, or in engineering are positively related to knowledge about renewable energy sources, which is in line with the results of Karatepe et al (2012) [30].…”

First steps towards sustainability? University freshmen perceptions on nature versus environment

“…Green educational initiatives have shown that individual behaviour can be influenced positively in the course outreach modules, which has also been shown at the outreach facility Biosphere 2; there, students not only gained system knowledge based on an informal half-day educational program, the latter also induced changes in motivation or fascination, which affect behaviour accordingly [78]. Furthermore, a classroom project demonstrated that energy consumption can be reduced within a ten-week intervention based on a daily routine to prompt environmentally friendly behaviour [79]. In this case, students who demonstrate lower environmental behaviour scores increase their knowledge (action-related and effectiveness knowledge) to the same level as those with higher scores.…”