Application of the Modified College Impact Model to Understand Chinese Engineering Undergraduates’ Sustainability Consciousness

Abstract

The college impact model provides a valuable framework for explaining various college student learning outcomes. However, few quantitative studies have examined the effectiveness of college impact model in explaining engineering undergraduates’ sustainability consciousness, a critical learning outcome in engineering education. This study proposes a modified college impact model to test the structural links among curriculum experiences, sustainable agency beliefs, and engineering undergraduates’ sustainability consciousness, and to explore the moderating effect of gender on the structural model. Data are collected from 1804 senior engineering students enrolled in five traditional engineering disciplines at 14 first-class engineering universities in China. Structural equation modeling was used for testing the research model. The results demonstrate that (1) curricular emphasis has a significant direct impact on all three dimensions of students’ sustainability consciousness, while instructional practice has a significant direct influence on the sustainability knowingness dimension; (2) both curricular emphasis and instructional practice have a significant indirect influence on sustainability consciousness through the full or partial mediation of sustainable agency beliefs; and (3) gender moderates several paths in the structural model. Theoretical and practical implications are provided, and suggestions for future research are offered.

The Relative Role of Knowledge and Empathy in Predicting Pro-Environmental Attitudes and Behavior

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“…Despite the acknowledged influence of education on student behavior (Brody & Ryu, 2006), students have received relatively limited attention in sustainability studies (Murray, 2018). Furthermore, much of the existing sustainability research tends to be descriptive in nature (Barth & Rieckmann, 2012), with few studies focusing specifically on the Asian continent (Kalsoom et al, 2017;Olsson et al, 2019;Zhao et al, 2020). This study aims to analyze the current level of sustainability awareness among university students, particularly examining the development of sustainability knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors, and exploring whether these behaviors are influenced by individuals' beliefs in their capacity to effect change.…”

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