More than two-thirds of undergraduate students have never participated in environmental awareness activities on campus, according to the first environmental survey conducted at Fairfield.
The survey, which invited all undergraduate students to answer questions about their environmental behaviors and ideologies, found that the majority of students who responded fail to bring about change by recycling or buying environmentally friendly goods.
However, 13 percent ranked the environment as the “most important issue today,” a number that is twice the national average.
Communications professor James Shanahan, co-creator of the survey, said this number surprised him, leading him to believe that those who responded are more conscious of the environment.
“For me, this is a representation of Fairfield’s greenest,” said Shanahan.
However, many more students ranked the war in Iraq/Afghanistan and the economy as more important issues.
“Even in a year like this where there is a big wave of environmental awareness, hot button issues like the war will always be considered more important,” he said.
About 7 percent of all undergraduate students responded, and there was a potential 6.17 sampling error. The respondents included roughly an equal representation of grade levels and reflected the different academic disciplines of the University.
Many of the questions on the survey asked specifically about environmental behaviors, such as recycling or conserving electrical energy.
Shanahan explained that the number of people who participated in environmentally friendly actions decreased as the action required more time and energy. For example, more students said they recycled than bought locally grown goods because recycling is a much easier activity to complete.
Being part of a pro-environment activity on campus proved to be one behavior most students did not participate in, although 59 percent were aware of the University’s Student Environmental Association (SEA).
The study also found that students who read newspapers and identified themselves as liberal were more likely to participate in pro-environmental activities, such as buying recycled paper or environmentally friendly lightbulbs.
Conversely, students who said they regularly watched TV were less likely to partake in these pro-environment activities.
As a graduate student, Shanahan studied how regular TV watchers tend to only value issues that are regularly discussed on television, which he said does not include environmental issues.
“If something is not portrayed in TV, heavy viewers are going to be less concerned about it,” he said.
According to the survey, students receive most of their information regarding the environment from, in order, the Internet, professors and newspapers.
Shanahan said he was pleased to hear that professors are a major source of environmental information and news.
“The interesting thing about that is how much professors influence the respondents on environmental issues,” he said. “It gives us something to think about in moving ahead in terms of the environment.”
Shanahan collaborated with James Simon, director of the English department, and two environmental classes to design the survey.
Both classes will be using the survey to explore environmental ideologies on campus.
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