Changing Spanish preservice teachers' environmental attitudes with a citizen science program integrated in Environmental Education subject

Abstract

This research analyzes the effect of the implementation ofcitizen science activities in the Environmental Education(EE) subject program of the Degree in Primary Educationapplying Experiential Learning Theory. EnvironmentalAttitudes Inventory (EAI) was used to measure the changein environmental attitudes (EA) of 173 preservice teachersthrough a pre-test–post-test experimental design withouta control group. Participation in the training program sig-nificantly improved EA in the 12 dimensions defined in theEAI. Of the dimensions included in the second order factorPreservation, Enjoyment of nature reached the largest effectsize and Environmental movement activism is the one thatobtains the smallest effect size. With regard to Utilization,all dimensions presented a large effect size. No significantdifferences were found in EA based on the gender variable.It can be concluded that the incorporation of citizen sci-ence activities in the EE program significantly improves EA.