Measuring student behavior change
In the summer of 2017, I served as a research fellow for the San Diego Zoo Institute for Conservation Research, Community Engagement division. There, I tackled the analysis of the San Diego Zoo's largest behavior change study to date: an investigation of the impact of conservation action pledges on students' environmental attitudes and behaviors. After wading through survey data from 2131 students (featuring a non-negligible number of poop emojis), I came to the exciting finding that students actually did engage in a conservation activity more after pledging to do so. I presented my results to over 120 educators around the San Diego Zoo that summer and continue to share the research at national conferences and, soon, through an academic publication.
Read the full abstract below:
Zoos frequently use conservation action pledges to encourage visitors to take small steps to help protect wildlife. This study investigates the effectiveness of a six-month pledging program carried out with middle and high school students visiting the San Diego Zoo Institute for Conservation Research on class field trips (n=2131). After receiving a lesson in conservation science, the students were given an opportunity to take a 30-day conservation action pledge. Pledge actions were presented to students in experimentally varied ways, and the pledge actions differed depending on the lesson's focal species. Students took a survey about their conservation knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors at the beginning of the field trip and again at one and two months after their visit. The results show that students really did change their behavior for the better after experiencing the field trip and pledging. However, there was no significant difference in the rate of action of pledgers compared to non-pledgers (one month after the field trip). We also found no differences in pledge follow-through between different experimental ways of presenting the pledge opportunities to the students. However, pledge actions differed significantly in rate of pledging, rate of taking action, and degree of change from baseline to the end of the one-month post visit period. Easy, familiar actions like picking up litter were common pledge choices; however, they resulted in little behavior change since students were already doing them to some extent before taking the pledge. More novel pledge actions saw larger positive behavior changes. We found that novel but approachable actions are best suited to a pledging campaign in this informal education setting.
Read the full abstract below:
Zoos frequently use conservation action pledges to encourage visitors to take small steps to help protect wildlife. This study investigates the effectiveness of a six-month pledging program carried out with middle and high school students visiting the San Diego Zoo Institute for Conservation Research on class field trips (n=2131). After receiving a lesson in conservation science, the students were given an opportunity to take a 30-day conservation action pledge. Pledge actions were presented to students in experimentally varied ways, and the pledge actions differed depending on the lesson's focal species. Students took a survey about their conservation knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors at the beginning of the field trip and again at one and two months after their visit. The results show that students really did change their behavior for the better after experiencing the field trip and pledging. However, there was no significant difference in the rate of action of pledgers compared to non-pledgers (one month after the field trip). We also found no differences in pledge follow-through between different experimental ways of presenting the pledge opportunities to the students. However, pledge actions differed significantly in rate of pledging, rate of taking action, and degree of change from baseline to the end of the one-month post visit period. Easy, familiar actions like picking up litter were common pledge choices; however, they resulted in little behavior change since students were already doing them to some extent before taking the pledge. More novel pledge actions saw larger positive behavior changes. We found that novel but approachable actions are best suited to a pledging campaign in this informal education setting.