Attitudes towards environmental responsibility in secondary schools

Abstract

The main aim of this research is to identify what type of attitudes secondary school students possess towards the environment. The level of environmental awareness was also be investigated, in order to identify whether the underlying environmental concepts are being understood correctly by the students. Another objective of this research was to identify whether any general trends in environmental attitudes are present among the secondary school student population. The research tool used was a Likert-Scale based questionnaire, made up of 20 statements that was distributed to Form 4 students in 7 different types of secondary schools around Malta. Through this study the presence of an overall positive environmental attitude among the secondary school students. Through particular statements the study identifies certain misconceptions in terms of environmental knowledge, throughout the student population. Differences in attitude between students who attend different types of schools were also reported. Students who attended Church schools and Junior Lyceums seem to have a more positive attitude than students who attended Area Secondary schools. No significant differences in overall attitude were identified between males and females. The research also proposes recommendations for further research.