Contact with nature: effects of field trips on pro-environmental knowledge, intentions and attitudes

Neiman, Zysman; Ades, César; Neiman, Zysman; Ades, César

doi:10.1590/1516-73132014000400008

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Ciência & Educação

versión impresa ISSN 1516-7313

Ciência educ. vol.20 no.04 Bauru oct./dic. 2014

https://doi.org/10.1590/1516-73132014000400008

Artigos

Contact with nature: effects of field trips on pro-environmental knowledge, intentions and attitudes

O contato com a natureza: efeitos de viagens ao campo sobre os conhecimentos intenções e atitudes pró-ambientais

Zysman Neiman^I

César Ades

¹Universidade Federal de São Paulo (UNIFESP), Rua Prof. Artur Riedel, 275, Jardim Eldorado, CEP 09972-270, Diadema, SP, Brasil

²Universidade de São Paulo (USP). † in memoriam

ABSTRACT

The effects of direct contact with nature on pro-environmental attitudes, values and knowledge were assessed by taking college students on field trips at Parque Estadual Turístico do Alto Ribeira (PETAR), and applying a system of directed activities developed throughout 16 years. The changes in knowledge, values and attitudes were evaluated in these students (experimental groups) and other students who were not exposed to the field trips (control groups) through questionnaires which were applied before (pre-tests) and after the trip (post-tests). Meaningful differences were verified between the control and the experimental groups, as well as discrepancies between the pre- and post-tests applied to the experimental groups - a clear indication that the direct contact with nature affected the positioning of the students towards environmental matters. These outcomes reinforce the idea of the importance of contact with nature as a way of implementing pro-environmental behaviors.

Key words: Environmental Education; Field Trip; Exposure to Natural; PETAR

RESUMO

Os efeitos do contato direto com a natureza nos conhecimentos, nas intenções e atitudes pró-ambientais foram avaliados durante viagens com estudantes universitários ao Parque Estadual Turístico do Alto Ribeira (PETAR), onde foram realizadas atividades dirigidas desenvolvidas ao longo de 16 anos. As mudanças nos conhecimentos, valores e atitudes foram avaliadas nesses alunos (grupos experimentais) e em outros, que não participaram das viagens (grupos- controle), por meio de questionários que foram aplicados antes (pré-testes) e depois da viagem (pós-testes). Diferenças significativas foram verificadas entre os grupos-controle e experimentais, bem como discrepâncias entre os pré e pós-testes aplicados aos grupos experimentais - uma clara indicação de que o contato direto com a natureza afetou o posicionamento dos alunos em relação às questões ambientais. Estes resultados reforçam a ideia da importância do contato com a natureza como forma de implementar comportamentos pró-ambientais.

Palavras-Chave: Educação Ambiental; Viagem a Campo; Exposição ao Natural; PETAR

Method

Participants

Participants were all college students, 17 to 25 years old, from a pedagogy course of the city of São Paulo (n = 52) and from a tourism course of the city of Sorocaba (n = 60). The number of male and female participants was practically equal in both the pedagogy (51,9% female; 48,1% male) and the tourism sample (51,7% female; 49,3% male). Students accepted to participate in the study on a voluntary basis.

Procedure

Pedagogy and tourism classes were assigned to experimental and control groups (pedagogy experimental, n = 27; pedagogy control, n = 25; tourism experimental, n = 31; tourism control, n = 29), each with approximately the same number of female and male participants. Participants in all groups filled up the same questionnaires at the same period, at the beginning and at the end of the experiment (pre-trip and post-trip tests); participants in the experimental groups were however the only ones that took part in the field trip. As 6 of the participants did not fill up the post test forms, they were not included in the pre/post-trip comparisons.

Ecological trips were carried out at the Parque Estadual Turístico do Alto Ribeira (PETAR) - Touristic State Park of Alto Ribeira -, located in one of the last remaining regions of preserved Atlantic Forest of the State of São Paulo, with the highest concentration of natural caves.

Visiting and guiding procedures were those developed by the first author during a sixteen-year program of trips with students to the PETAR (more than a hundred visits from 1991 to 2007). The main objective of such trips was to draw participants' attention to relevant aspects of the natural and social environment through determined activities. Under the supervision of guides, they went through trails and galleries, followed underground rivers, exposed themselves to the darkness of the caves, detected and described the animals found. All activities were performed in a cooperative and playful way. They were also given information about the main environmental and cultural characteristics of the PETAR and surrounding region and were stimulated to interact with people from the local community. It was expected that they could thus obtain integrated knowledge about the history and present natural and social characteristics of the region. A special emphasis was put on the participants' sensory and emotional experience in contact with the environment.

After a two-day period of contact with the natural caves of PETAR, participants were taken to another state park, the Parque Estadual Jacupiranga, where they could visit the cave "Caverna do Diabo" (Devil's Cave), an artificially illuminated cave with stairways and paths built to facilitate mass tourism. Participants were encouraged to compare the feelings and impressions they got at the natural caves of PETAR and at the highly transformed "Caverna do Diabo" and to discuss the theme of distance between human and the nature.

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Received: August 27, 2013; Accepted: May 14, 2014

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