Preschool children's attitudes towards selected environmental issues

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Tezin Türü: Yüksek Lisans

Tezin Yürütüldüğü Kurum: Orta Doğu Teknik Üniversitesi, Eğitim Fakültesi, Temel Eğitim Bölümü, Türkiye

Tezin Onay Tarihi: 2010

Tezin Dili: İngilizce

Öğrenci: DENİZ KAHRİMAN ÖZTÜRK

Asıl Danışman (Eş Danışmanlı Tezler İçin): Refika Olgan

Eş Danışman: Gaye Teksöz

Özet:

The purpose of this study is to explore preschool children’s attitudes towards environmental issues in terms of consumption patterns, environmental protection, recycling-reusing, and living habits and to investigate gender as a factor affecting environmental attitudes. The sample of the study is comprised of 40 preschool age children living in Ankara, Turkey. The research has been realized by qualitative design and the data were collected through interviews. The interview questionnaire was adapted from ―The Children's Attitudes toward the Environment Scale-Preschool Version‖ (CATES-PV) (Musser & Diamond, 1999) and contains 15 interview questions and sub-questions. Theadapted version of the questionnaire was supported with a picture format, designed by the researcher, which explicitly defines each item. Findings of this study indicated that, most of the 5-6 years old children of this study have ecocentric attitudes towards environmental issues for the all dimensions, at a first glance. However, children’s explanations as a result of in depth interviews were evaluated as anthropocentric for such attitudes. Finally, no difference was detected according to gender regarding to environmental attitudes of preschool children.