Published
2026-02-05
Section
Research Articles
License
Copyright (c) 2026 Meng Wang*

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
The journal adopts the Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0), which means that anyone can reuse and redistribute the materials for non-commercial purposes as long as you follow the license terms and the original source is properly cited.
Author(s) shall retain the copyright of their work and grant the Journal/Publisher rights for the first publication with the work concurrently licensed since 2023 Vol.8 No.2.
Under this license, author(s) will allow third parties to download, reuse, reprint, modify, distribute and/or copy the content under the condition that the authors are given credit. No permission is required from the authors or the publisher.
This broad license intends to facilitate free access, as well as the unrestricted use of original works of all types. This ensures that the published work is freely and openly available in perpetuity.
By providing open access, the following benefits are brought about:
- Higher Visibility, Availability and Citations-free and unlimited accessibility of the publication over the internet without any restrictions increases citation of the article.
- Ease of search-publications are easily searchable in search engines and indexing databases.
- Rapid Publication – accepted papers are immediately published online.
- Available for free download immediately after publication at https://esp.as-pub.com/index.php/ESP

Copyright Statement
1.The authors certify that the submitted manuscripts are original works, do not infringe the rights of others, are free from academic misconduct and confidentiality issues, and that there are no disputes over the authorship scheme of the collaborative articles. In case of infringement, academic misconduct and confidentiality issues, as well as disputes over the authorship scheme, all responsibilities will be borne by the authors.
2. The author agrees to grant the Editorial Office of Environment and Social Psychology a licence to use the reproduction right, distribution right, information network dissemination right, performance right, translation right, and compilation right of the submitted manuscript, including the work as a whole, as well as the diagrams, tables, abstracts, and any other parts that can be extracted from the work and used in accordance with the characteristics of the journal. The Editorial Board of Environment and Social Psychology has the right to use and sub-licence the above mentioned works for wide dissemination in print, electronic and online versions, and, in accordance with the characteristics of the periodical, for the period of legal protection of the property right of the copyright in the work, and for the territorial scope of the work throughout the world.
3. The authors are entitled to the copyright of their works under the relevant laws of Singapore, provided that they do not exercise their rights in a manner prejudicial to the interests of the Journal.
About Licence
Environment and Social Psychology is an open access journal and all published work is available under the Creative Commons Licence, Authors shall retain copyright of their work and grant the journal/publisher the right of first publication, and their work shall be licensed under the Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0).
Under this licence, the author grants permission to third parties to download, reuse, reprint, modify, distribute and/or copy the content with attribution to the author. No permission from the author or publisher is required.
This broad licence is intended to facilitate free access to and unrestricted use of original works of all kinds. This ensures that published works remain free and accessible in perpetuity. Submitted manuscripts, once accepted, are immediately available to the public and permanently accessible free of charge on the journal’s official website (https://esp.as-pub.com/index.php/ESP). Allowing users to read, download, copy, print, search for or link to the full text of the article, or use it for other legal purposes. However, the use of the work must retain the author's signature, be limited to non-commercial purposes, and not be interpretative.
Click to download <Agreement on the Licence for the Use of Copyright on Environmental and Social Psychology>.
How to Cite
Effects of ecological education intervention on adolescents' sustainability literacy and environmental responsibility: A quasi-experimental study
Meng Wang*
Faculty of Business and Communication, INTI International University, Persiaran Perdana BBN, Putra Nilai, 71800 Nilai, Negeri Sembilan
DOI: https://doi.org/10.59429/esp.v11i2.4448
Keywords: ecological education; sustainability literacy; environmental responsibility; adolescents; quasi-experimental design; gender differences
Abstract
Limited empirical evidence exists regarding the intervention effects of environmental education on adolescents despite the growing focus on sustainable development education in the global policy space. This study used publicly available data from the PISA 2018 database to analyze 2,847 students’ (51.7% female; mean age = 15.4 years) responses from 42 schools in China to investigate the effects of comprehensive ecological education programmes on adolescents’ sustainability literacy and environmental responsibility. Schools were grouped as intervention (n = 1,456) or control (n = 1,391) based on program implementation. To estimate the effects of the intervention, multiple regression and propensity score matching were used, with gender being investigated as a potential effect modifier. Students in ecological education programs demonstrated significantly higher levels of sustainability literacy (β = .19, p < .001, d = 0.47) and environmental responsibility (β = .16, p < .001, d = 0.38) than controls. The largest effects were observed for environmental knowledge (d = 0.52) and personal environmental responsibility (d = 0.42). Gender had a significant moderating effect on these outcomes. Female students showed stronger gains in sustainability literacy (d = 0.56 vs. 0.35) and environmental responsibility (d = 0.50 vs. 0.29). The findings indicate that comprehensive ecological education programs are positively associated with adolescents' sustainability competencies. Results were consistent in multilevel modelling, propensity score matching, and subgroup analyses. Educational policies focusing on ecology education at secondary level and gender differences in intervention responses need to adopt diverse pedagogical strategies.
References
[1]. 1.H. Lee et al., Climate change 2023: synthesis report. Contribution of working groups I, II and III to the sixth assessment report of the intergovernmental panel on climate change. 2023.
[2]. 2.Z. Sayed, "Transforming our world: The 2030 agenda for sustainable development," Ethics & Critical Thinking Journal, vol. 2015, no. 3, 2015.
[3]. 3.S. Grapsas, J. van de Wetering, J. Spitzer, A. M. Poorthuis, and S. Thomaes, "When sustainability aligns with adolescent motives: Development and validation of the Sustainability Motive-Alignment Scale (SMAS)," Applied Developmental Science, vol. 28, no. 4, pp. 612-633, 2024.
[4]. 4.P. C. Bhattarai, R. Shrestha, S. Ray, and R. Knez, "Determinants of adolescents’ pro-sustainable behavior: a systematic literature review using PRISMA," Discover Sustainability, vol. 5, no. 1, p. 112, 2024.
[5]. 5.S.-J. Sanchez, Y. Piedrahita Guzman, J. Sosa-Molano, D. Robertson, S. Ahern, and T. Garza, "Systematic literature review: a typology of Sustainability Literacy and Environmental Literacy," in Frontiers in Education, 2025, vol. 10: Frontiers Media SA, p. 1490791.
[6]. 6.P. V. Lisboa, C. Gómez-Román, L. Guntín, and A. P. Monteiro, "Pro-environmental behavior, personality and emotional intelligence in adolescents: a systematic review," Frontiers in Psychology, vol. 15, p. 1323098, 2024.
[7]. 7.J. van de Wetering, S. Grapsas, A. Poorthuis, and S. Thomaes, "Promoting adolescents' pro‐environmental behavior: A motive‐alignment approach," Journal of Research on Adolescence, vol. 35, no. 1, p. e13044, 2025.
[8]. 8.A. Décamps, G. Barbat, J.-C. Carteron, V. Hands, and C. Parkes, "Sulitest: A collaborative initiative to support and assess sustainability literacy in higher education," The International Journal of Management Education, vol. 15, no. 2, pp. 138-152, 2017.
[9]. 9.C. Kuehl, A. C. Sparks, H. Hodges, and E. R. Smith, "Exploring sustainability literacy: developing and assessing a bottom-up measure of what students know about sustainability," Frontiers in Sustainability, vol. 4, p. 1167041, 2023.
[10]. 10.R. E. Dunlap, K. D. Van Liere, A. G. Mertig, and R. E. Jones, "New trends in measuring environmental attitudes: measuring endorsement of the new ecological paradigm: a revised NEP scale," Journal of social issues, vol. 56, no. 3, pp. 425-442, 2000.
[11]. 11.M. A. Prialé et al., "Measurement of sustainable attitudes: a scale for business students," International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education, vol. 25, no. 8, pp. 2017-2039, 2024.
[12]. 12.M. Bøhlerengen and N. Wiium, "Environmental attitudes, behaviors, and responsibility perceptions among Norwegian youth: Associations with positive youth development indicators," Frontiers in Psychology, vol. 13, p. 844324, 2022.
[13]. 13.S. Collado, C. D. Rosa, and J. A. Corraliza, "The effect of a nature-based environmental education program on children’s environmental attitudes and behaviors: A randomized experiment with primary schools," Sustainability, vol. 12, no. 17, p. 6817, 2020.
[14]. 14.S. Otto, G. W. Evans, M. J. Moon, and F. G. Kaiser, "The development of children’s environmental attitude and behavior," Global Environmental Change, vol. 58, p. 101947, 2019.
[15]. 15.D. Olsson and N. Gericke, "The effect of gender on students' sustainability consciousness: A nationwide Swedish study," The journal of environmental education, vol. 48, no. 5, pp. 357-370, 2017.
[16]. 16.M. J. Stern, R. B. Powell, and D. Hill, "Environmental education program evaluation in the new millennium: What do we measure and what have we learned?," Environmental Education Research, vol. 20, no. 5, pp. 581-611, 2014.
[17]. 17.N. M. Ardoin, A. W. Bowers, and E. Gaillard, "Environmental education outcomes for conservation: A systematic review," Biological conservation, vol. 241, p. 108224, 2020.
[18]. 18.K. Wang and L. Zhang, "The impact of ecological civilization theory on university students’ pro-environmental behavior: an application of knowledge-attitude-practice theoretical model," Frontiers in Psychology, vol. 12, p. 681409, 2021.
[19]. 19.C. S. Reichardt, Quasi-experimentation: A guide to design and analysis. Guilford Publications, 2019.
[20]. 20.O. Pisa, "results (Volume VI): Are students ready to thrive in an interconnected world," ed: OECD: Paris, France, 2020.
[21]. 21.J. F. Hair, W. C. Black, B. J. Babin, R. E. Anderson, and R. L. Tatham, "Multivariate data analysis," ed: Cengage learning Hampshire, 2019.
[22]. 22.C. Fornell and D. F. Larcker, "Evaluating structural equation models with unobservable variables and measurement error," Journal of marketing research, vol. 18, no. 1, pp. 39-50, 1981.
[23]. 23.L. t. Hu and P. M. Bentler, "Cutoff criteria for fit indexes in covariance structure analysis: Conventional criteria versus new alternatives," Structural equation modeling: a multidisciplinary journal, vol. 6, no. 1, pp. 1-55, 1999.
[24]. 24.C. K. Enders, Applied missing data analysis. Guilford Publications, 2022.
[25]. 25.B. G. Tabachnick, L. S. Fidell, and J. B. Ullman, Using multivariate statistics (no. 7). pearson Boston, MA, 2007.
[26]. 26.J. Boeve-de Pauw, N. Gericke, D. Olsson, and T. Berglund, "The effectiveness of education for sustainable development," Sustainability, vol. 7, no. 11, pp. 15693-15717, 2015.
[27]. 27.M. Varela-Losada, P. Vega-Marcote, U. Pérez-Rodríguez, and M. Álvarez-Lires, "Going to action? A literature review on educational proposals in formal Environmental Education," Environmental education research, vol. 22, no. 3, pp. 390-421, 2016.
[28]. 28.J. Cohen, Statistical power analysis for the behavioral sciences. routledge, 2013.
[29]. 29.M. A. Kraft, "Interpreting effect sizes of education interventions," Educational researcher, vol. 49, no. 4, pp. 241-253, 2020.
[30]. 30.J. Hattie, Visible learning: A synthesis of over 800 meta-analyses relating to achievement. routledge, 2008.
[31]. 31.S. Bamberg and G. Möser, "Twenty years after Hines, Hungerford, and Tomera: A new meta-analysis of psycho-social determinants of pro-environmental behavior," Journal of environmental psychology, vol. 27, no. 1, pp. 14-25, 2007.
[32]. 32.L. Scannell and R. Gifford, "The relations between natural and civic place attachment and pro-environmental behavior," Journal of environmental psychology, vol. 30, no. 3, pp. 289-297, 2010.
[33]. 33.D. Sobel, "Place-based education: Connecting classrooms and communities," Education for meaning and social justice, vol. 17, no. 3, pp. 63-64, 2004.
[34]. 34.L. C. Zelezny, P. Chua, and C. Aldrich, "Elaborating on gender differences in environmentalism-statistical data included," Journal of social issues, vol. 56, no. 3, pp. 443-445, 2000.
[35]. 35.T. L. Milfont and C. G. Sibley, "The big five personality traits and environmental engagement: Associations at the individual and societal level," Journal of environmental Psychology, vol. 32, no. 2, pp. 187-195, 2012.
[36]. 36.T. Dietz, L. Kalof, and P. C. Stern, "Gender, values, and environmentalism," Social science quarterly, vol. 83, no. 1, pp. 353-364, 2002.
[37]. 37.K. T. Stevenson et al., "Role of significant life experiences in building environmental knowledge and behavior among middle school students," The Journal of Environmental Education, vol. 45, no. 3, pp. 163-177, 2014.
[38]. 38.P. Rosenbaum, Observation and experiment: An introduction to causal inference. Harvard University Press, 2017.
[39]. 39.M. C. Monroe, R. R. Plate, A. Oxarart, A. Bowers, and W. A. Chaves, "Identifying effective climate change education strategies: A systematic review of the research," Environmental Education Research, vol. 25, no. 6, pp. 791-812, 2019.
[40]. 40.Y. Guo and X. Li, "Regional inequality in China's educational development: An urban-rural comparison," Heliyon, vol. 10, no. 4, 2024.
[41]. 41.Z. Xiong, Y. Song, and R. Zhu, "Pedagogical strategies for teaching environmental literacy in secondary school education: A systematic review," Sustainability, vol. 17, no. 20, p. 9104, 2025.
[42]. 42.C. Kormos and R. Gifford, "The validity of self-report measures of proenvironmental behavior: A meta-analytic review," Journal of Environmental Psychology, vol. 40, pp. 359-371, 2014.






