Attitudes, knowledge, behaviour of first-year biology and physics education students pertaining to the environment

In this study, it was aimed to investigate whether there exist differences between the attitudes and behaviour of first-year biology education and physics education students towards the environment. It was investigated whether there were differences between the attitudes and behaviour of first-year biology education students, who had been enrolled in the program in 2011-2012, towards the environment and those of first-year physics education students, who were thought to have different (positive/negative) environmental attitudes and behaviour. Findings were analysed using statistical methods, which led to the conclusion that there are differences between the environmental attitudes and behaviour of the 2 groups (p < 0.05). It was determined that biology education students were more conscious than physics education students for environmental discussion issues. It is thus possible to argue that these differences had been the main factor behind their selection of different branches of science.