The development of trust in residential environmental education programs

Abstract

Trust, a relational phenomenon that is an important building block of interpersonal relationships and within society, can also be an intermediary outcome of field-based environmental education programs. Trust creates a foundation for collaboration and decision-making, which are core to many ultimate outcomes of environmental education. Yet, understanding how trust develops among environmental education program participants is still nascent, partly because few methods exist for measuring trust in informal contexts, such as those that are common for many environmental education programs. Our study used social network analysis and qualitative data from focus groups, questionnaires, and participant observation to investigate the development of trust among residential environmental education program participants in two school groups, some of whom had initial familiarity with each other. Network data indicated differential increases in peer-to-peer trust among group members when measured at the individual level. Qualitative data from the focus groups highlighted salient dimensions of trust that were particularly relevant in this setting, including friendship, emotional and physical safety, and self-disclosure; reciprocal trust among peers and educators; and aspects of this immersive setting that fostered trust among the participants.

Keywords:

• trust
• intermediary outcomes
• residential environmental education

Acknowledgments

We are grateful to NatureBridge field science educators and administrators for their input and insights; students in the Theory and Practice of Environmental Education; EDUC332 students, who piloted early versions of these instruments; and Nicole Holthuis and Deb Wojcik for their research support. We appreciate the NatureBridge student participants and their teachers, whose thoughtful reflections and generosity with their time made this study possible. Thanks to the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, who supported this and related studies.

Funding

This work was supported by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation.

Notes

1. See NatureBridge’s Core Education Framework (2012): http://www.naturebridge.org/how-we-teach.

2. NatureBridge considers the optimal group size to be 12–15, based on adventure education literature (e.g. Hattie et al. 1997; McKenzie 2000), which indicates that groups of 7–15 participants may be ideal for facilitating collaborative learning and bonding. Hiking groups are led by a Field Science Educator and accompanied by classroom teachers and/or chaperones. Classroom teachers organize groups based on a number of factors, including their knowledge of peer relationships within the classroom and/or group diversity; however, we did not explicitly investigate how teachers organize these groups.

3. Outdoor adventure education differs from environmental education in that it places a heavier emphasis on the inter- and intrapersonal relationships among participants and less emphasis on the environmental content and context, as well as resulting (pro)environmental behaviors (D’Amato and Krasny 2011).

4. All names are pseudonyms.