Level of environmental intelligence among university students from selected countries of Central and Eastern Europe

Abstract

ABSTRACTThe aim of this article was to characterise and compare the level of environmental intelligence among university students from selected countries of Central and Eastern Europe. This was done using empirical data collected by the author in 2015. In the introduction and theoretical part of this text, the term ‘environmental intelligence’ is defined, and issues raised by modern sociologists such as M. Maffesoli and M. Archer are presented. Two hypotheses stating that respondents from Poland, Slovakia and Czech Republic have higher levels of environmental intelligence than university students from the Ukraine, and those studying natural sciences have higher levels of environmental intelligence than students of the humanities or social sciences were verified. The statistical analysis conducted in the second part of the text revealed a higher level of environmental intelligence among students from the European Union countries compared to respondents from the Ukraine. However, there were no significant differences between the level of environmental intelligence and respondents’ faculty of studies. This indicates that studying natural sciences did not contribute to a more dynamic development of environmental intelligence in students. This revelation may be disturbing, as the state of the environment cannot improve if young people cannot use and care for it responsibly.