Knowledge of Trainee Teachers about the New Water Culture: A Comparative Study between Two Spanish Cities

Abstract

Education is the main tool society has for transforming cultural habits and making them more sustainable. This work entails a comparative study in the sphere of initial teacher training regarding the knowledge of future educators on the New Water Culture (NWC). An ad-hoc questionnaire was administered to a sample of 1387 future primary and secondary school teachers studying in Granada (N = 942) and Melilla (N = 455), both Spanish cities with diverse education and water conditions. The results indicate that the trainee teachers in Granada display knowledge more in line with the NWC. However, there are contents where the results are inverted due to the media impact regarding water in Melilla. Furthermore, it is confirmed that both groups lack correct training that allows them to transfer appropriate knowledge effectively and thus create new behaviours in future generations in a visible and permanent way.