“I Wanted a Profession That Makes a Difference”—An Online Survey of First-Year Students’ Study Choice Motives and Sustainability-Related Attributes

Anna Oberrauch, Helga Mayr, Ivan Nikitin, Tanja Bügler, Thorsten Kosler and Christian Vollmer
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Anna Oberrauch: Department of Research and Development in Teacher Education, University College of Teacher Education Tyrol, 6020 Innsbruck, Austria
Helga Mayr: Department of Research and Development in Teacher Education, University College of Teacher Education Tyrol, 6020 Innsbruck, Austria
Ivan Nikitin: Department Entrepreneurial Management, University of Applied Science of the Grisons, 7000 Chur, Switzerland
Tanja Bügler: Department Alpine Region Development, University of Applied Science of the Grisons, 7000 Chur, Switzerland
Thorsten Kosler: Department of Research and Development in Teacher Education, University College of Teacher Education Tyrol, 6020 Innsbruck, Austria
Christian Vollmer: Department of Research and Development in Teacher Education, University College of Teacher Education Tyrol, 6020 Innsbruck, Austria

Sustainability, 2021, vol. 13, issue 15, 1-28

Abstract: Higher education institutions are obligated to facilitate students in the development of sustainability competencies, which enable them to act as “change agents” in their future profession-specific environment. Therefore, students’ study motives, prior knowledge, attitudes, and experiences regarding sustainability should be considered when designing Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) programmes. The present study compares first-year students in teacher training with first-year students in other study programmes and explores their study choice motives as well as sustainability-related conceptions, engagement and self-efficacy beliefs using a semi-standardised online questionnaire. Results show that the choice of study is dominated by intrinsic factors and the relevance of extrinsic factors differs by degree programmes with lower extrinsic values for the teacher training students. Regarding sustainability, we find simple and often unelaborated concepts. Teacher training students show significantly higher scores than non-teacher training students regarding the sustainability-related behavioural domain and self-efficacy beliefs. In addition, a gender gap increasing with age and with lower sustainability scores for older males could be identified but only for teacher training students. In conclusion, the results show valuable starting points as well as challenges that should be considered when designing target-oriented learning processes in (inter)disciplinary sustainability courses at higher education institutions.

Keywords: higher education; education for sustainable development; study-choice motivation; sustainability conceptions; sustainability engagement; self-efficacy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

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