Environmental Attitudes among Youth: How Much Do the Educational Characteristics of Parents and Young People Matter?

Abstract

Research shows that education increases environmental attitudes, yet there is a lack of studies examining young people’s attitudes and the role of various educational characteristics in youth’s environmental engagement. The main aim of our study was to examine how several educational characteristics of young people and their parents impact youth’s environmental attitudes. We employed a survey sample of 14–34-year-olds (N = 1508; Mage = 19.25 years) collected in January 2020. The impact of five educational variables was tested: maternal and paternal educational level; students’ educational stage (primary, secondary and tertiary school students); educational track of secondary students (vocational, professional and general); and youth’s educational status (currently in education vs. not in education). We controlled for several demographic and economic confounding factors in multivariate analyses. These indicate significant between-track differences in environmental attitudes among secondary school students, while educational status and educational stage have no significant impact on environmental attitudes. In addition, the father’s (but not the mother’s) education increases Slovenian youngsters’ environmental attitudes. As findings indicate significant differences between educational tracks of secondary students independent of their parental education and other personal and family characteristics, educators may want to revise vocational and professional secondary school syllabuses to include an increased number of environmental, climate change and sustainability topics.