Major factors contributing to environmental awareness among people in a third world country/Jordan

Abstract

The objective of this research was to evaluate the major factors contributing to environmental awareness among people in a third world country such as Jordan. Two thousand individuals from different locations in the southern part of Jordan participated in the survey and completed the questionnaire in the fall of 2004. The questionnaire consisted of 30 questions grouped into the following categories of major environmental issues: general environmental problems, air pollution, water resources, solid waste, noise pollution, and desertification. The target population encompassed people with different backgrounds including gender, age, education levels, location of residency, and social status. The questionnaire was distributed according to the population density throughout five major cities and 59 villages. Analysis of Variance was conducted on the means of the sample populations determined by gender, age, education, and geographic distribution to verify that the apparent differences of the means were statistically significant. The environmental awareness of females in this study as quantified by an overall index exceeded that of males in each of the individual cities and villages surveyed and therefore throughout the region. For the entire study, the overall index was 65.3–62.8, respectively. The statistical results of the survey revealed that the city of Aqaba in the southern region of Jordan had greater environmental awareness than the other cities surveyed. Environmental awareness among university students increased linearly as they proceeded from the first year to the fifth year. The education level of the survey respondents played a significant role in the degree of environmental awareness in all cities and villages surveyed. Environmental awareness was also affected by the difference in age range, with the older groups having more consistent responses and higher overall index of environmental awareness.