Promoting connectedness with nature through environmental education

Abstract

It has been suggested that a positive human–nature relationship is essential for countering today’s environmental problems. Prior environmental education research has focused largely on knowledge or attitudinal outcomes, and few studies have examined the ability of environmental education programmes to promote connectedness with nature. Therefore, our goal was to (1) examine differences in connectedness with nature among a sample of children with differing ages and academic tracks, and (2) investigate whether environmental education can help promote and sustain connectedness with nature. With a pre-, post- and retention test design, we assessed a comprehensive four-day environmental education programme on water at a school field centre, using the inclusion of nature in self (INS) scale to identify the change in connectedness of 9–10-year-old pupils and 11–13-year-old pupils. We found that younger children and university-track pupils had higher INS scores than older children and general-education-track pupils, respectively. Participating in environmental education resulted in a robust short-term increase in connectedness with nature in both age groups. However, only the younger pupils’ connectedness remained sustained four weeks following the treatment. Environmental educators should keep in mind that strengthening connectedness to nature is more sustainable before the age of 11.

Keywords:

• inclusion of nature in self
• relationship to nature
• environmental education
• preadolescent students
• age-related change

Acknowledgements

The authors wish to thank the second author for allocating INS data (sixth-grade university-track pupils) from her own study. We would also like to acknowledge the statistical support of Michael Wiseman and Alexandra Kibbe. We appreciate the support of the school field centre ‘Schullandheim Weißenstadt’ and especially Anne Gebhardt and Cornelia Riedel for their support during the programme implementation, and we thank all participating students and their teachers.