Students’ Care for Dogs, Environmental Attitudes, and Behaviour

Abstract

Does the act of caring for a dog have a substantial connection to the environmental values and behaviours of children? The scientific current literature contains little empirical research regarding the effect of pet ownership on environmental attitudes and behaviours in children. The Two Factor Model of Environmental Values (2-MEV) scale and the General Ecological Behaviour (GEB) scale were applied to measure environmental attitudes/values and ecological behaviours aligned with the Children's Care for Dogs Questionnaire (CTDQ) to measure individual care for dogs.The subjects were Slovenian adolescents in primary education and lower secondary education. A clear relationship emerged: students that reported a better level of care for their pet dogs tended to engage in more environmentally responsible behaviours. Preservation and utilization attitudes had no significant influence on caring for a dog. Female students tended to report better care for dogs and practiced environmental behaviour more often. Younger students scored higher on the preservation values and practiced environmental behaviour more often. Overall, this study provides an evidence-based framework for educational initiatives that aim to include long-term care for animals. This study proposes a method with which educational programs could achieve the goal of fostering environmental behaviours.

Predicting pro-environmental behaviours: the role of environmental values, attitudes and knowledge

“…Furthermore, human attitude is a strong predictor for subsequent behaviours. This notion also applies to environmental behaviour studies (Jaku cionyt_ e-Skodien_ e et al, 2020; Torkar et al, 2020). Although this study found no direct impact of attitude on environmental behaviours, the interaction of attitude and egoistic value deteriorated pro-environmental behaviours.…”

“…Some previous findings have supported that (pro-)environmental behaviours were influenced by values, attitudes, and knowledge (Wang et al, 2020;Torkar et al, 2020;Tian et al, 2020;Liu et al, 2020;van Riper et al, 2019;Janmaimool and Khajohnmanee, 2019;Casal o et al, 2019). However, researchers should understand that knowledge and egoistic value to some degree could hinder an individual's pro-environmental behaviours.…”

Evaluating a Novel Learning Intervention Grounded in the Education for Environmental Citizenship Pedagogical Approach: A Case Study from Cyprus

“…This hypothesis was motivated by the findings of prior empirical studies in the field of environmental education. More specifically, prior research has shown a gender difference in pro-environmentalism (i.e., positive environmental attitudes, values and/or behaviors) with girls outperforming boys in primary and secondary education [39][40][41][42], and, later on in adulthood, with females outperforming males [43][44][45].…”

A Grounded Theory of Pro-Nature Behaviour: From Moral Concern to Sustained Action

“…Previous research has shown that pet ownership is associated with concern for species preservation and less support for strategies that put human needs above those of wildlife [50]. Adolescents who provide more care for their family dog have been found to engage in more pro-environmental behaviours [51]. Chawla [52] also summarised research findings in which concern for non-human species is enhanced by exposure to and exploration of nature in childhood.…”