The relationship between students’ ecocentric, anthropocentric and antipathic attitudes towards the environment and their academic achievement

Abstract

The purpose of the current study is to determine the relationship between secondary and high school students’ ecocentric, anthropocentric and antiphatic attitudes towards the environment and their academic achievement. The study was conducted with the participation of totally 854 students attending secondary and high schools in the city of Aksaray in the spring term of 2013-2014 school year. In the collection of the data, “Ecocentric, Anthropocentric and Antipathic Environmental Attitude Scale” developed by Thompson and Barton (1994) and adapted to Turkish by Erten (2007) was used. In the analysis of the data, one-way variance analysis and Pearson Correlation analysis were conducted. At the end of the study, a significant difference was found in the ecocentric attitude mean scores of the secondary school students in favor of the students having higher academic achievement (F=3.161; p<.05) and a significant difference was found in the antipathic attitude scores of the students in favor of those having lower academic achievement (F=14.700; p<.001). No significant difference based on the students’ academic achievement was found in the students’ anthropocentric attitude scores (F=.755; p>.05). The high school students’ ecocentric, anthropocentric and anthipatic attitude scores were found to be not significantly varying depending on their academic achievement (F=.749, .287 and 2.113; p>.05, respectively). On the other hand, a low and positive correlation was found between the secondary school students’ academic achievements in Science and Social Studies courses and their ecocentric attitude scores (r=.139, .144; p<.01, respectively) and a negative correlation was found with their achievements and antipathic attitude scores (r=-.242, -.284; p<.001, respectively). No significant correlation was found between their achievements in these courses and anthropocentric attitude scores. A low and positive correlation was found between the high school students’ ecocentric attitude scores and their academic achievement in Geography course (r=.126; p<.05). A low and negative correlation was found between the students’ antipathic attitude scores and their achievements in Biology course (r=-.237; p<.01), in Chemistry course (r=-.145; p<.05) and in Geography course (r=-.128; p<.05). No significant correlation was found between the students’ anthropocentric attitude scores and their achievements in these courses. No significant correlation was found between the students’ anthropocentric and antipathic environmental attitudes and their academic achievements in Physics and Health Knowledge courses. In light of the findings of the study, some suggestions were made.

Keywords: ecocentric, anthropocentric and antipathetic attitude, environmental attitude, secondary school, high school, academic achievement