SGER: Exploratory Study of the Relationship between Students ' Mental Models of Climate Change and Their Environmentally Sustainable Decisions and Behavior

这一SGER的目的是发展学生对气候变化概念的测量，并检验环境可持续决策和行为与这些自然世界概念相关的猜想。具体地说，这项研究的问题是：(1)能否可靠、有效和有效地测量气候变化的心理模型，以衡量学生的理解：(2)如果是这样，初中生、高中生和大学生对气候变化的心理模型是什么？(3)学生的心理模型与他们的人口统计特征、报告的关于气候变化的行为和政策偏好之间的相关性是什么？该项目是及时的，因为环境问题正受到媒体的广泛报道和公众的广泛讨论。提高我们对什么样的教育干预措施改变学生在气候变化问题上的行为的理解具有国家重要性。这项研究将启动一种创新的方法，以建立关于中学生和大学生如何以及为什么改变他们围绕气候变化这一关键问题的行为的实证知识库。

The purpose of this SGER is to develop measures of students' conception of climate change and examine the conjecture that environmentally sustainable decisions and behavior are related to these conceptions of the natural world. Specifically, the study asks: (1) Can mental models of climate change be measured reliably, validly and efficiently to provide a gauge on students' understanding: (2) if so, what mental models of Climate Change do middle, high school and college students hold? (3) What is the correlation between students' mental models and their demographic characteristics, reported behavioral and policy preferences regarding Climate Change?The project is timely because environmental issues are receiving wide media coverage and much public discussion. Improving our understanding of what kinds of education interventions alter students' behaviors around climate change is of national importance. The study would initiate an innovative approach to building the empirical knowledge base about how and why secondary school and college students' alter their behaviors around the critical issue of climate change.