A Longitudinal Evaluation of Systems Thinking Pedagogy on the Pro-Environmental Behavioral Intentions of University Students

Abstract

Environmental sustainability has become one of the most pressing issues within higher education, especially in developing or transitional economies, wherein universities are required to produce students ready to act responsibly both socially and environmentally. The current study aims to examine the long-term effects of systems thinking pedagogy on pro-environmental behavioral intentions among university students in Uzbekistan. The research will utilize a longitudinal quasi-experimental approach using 240 university students from some selected Uzbek universities, which will be split into two groups: an experimental group and a control group. The former group will receive systems thinking environmental pedagogic practices like causal loop mapping, sustainability cases analysis, feedback relationships identification, problem-solving activities, whereas the latter group will receive traditional environmental education. Data will be gathered at three different stages: T1, before intervention; T2, post-intervention; and T3, follow-up at 8–12 weeks after intervention. A structured Likert-scale questionnaire will measure environmental awareness, systems thinking proficiency, environmental attitude, perceived behavioral control, and pro-environmental behavioral intentions. Measurement reliability and validity tests yielded satisfactory levels of internal consistencies with Cronbach's alpha coefficients varying between 0.80 and 0.89. These results reveal that the experimental group's mean score increased significantly from T1 (3.12) to T2 (4.18). Although a slight decay was observed at the follow-up stage T3 (4.05), their overall long-term retention remained vastly superior to their initial baseline. On the contrary, the control group only managed to achieve a modest change from T1 (3.10) to T3 (3.36). Therefore, it can be concluded that systems thinking-based pedagogical approach yielded greater and more persistent behavioral intentions than traditional methods of education. In general, these results demonstrate the importance of systems thinking incorporation into sustainability learning practices for raising environmental consciousness, behavioral self-confidence, and responsibility of university students.