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Addressing Ecoparalysis: A Community-Engaged Unit Enhances Undergraduate Student Environmental Value and Problem-Solving Self-Efficacy

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Title: Addressing Ecoparalysis: A Community-Engaged Unit Enhances Undergraduate Student Environmental Value and Problem-Solving Self-Efficacy
Language: English
Authors: Kelsey S. Bitting (ORCID 0000-0003-3380-3822), Jessica A. Merricks (ORCID 0000-0002-8410-8208)
Source: Environmental Education Research. 2025 31(3):529-547.
Availability: Routledge. Available from: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. 530 Walnut Street Suite 850, Philadelphia, PA 19106. Tel: 800-354-1420; Tel: 215-625-8900; Fax: 215-207-0050; Web site: http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals
Peer Reviewed: Y
Page Count: 19
Publication Date: 2025
Document Type: Journal Articles
Reports - Research
Education Level: Higher Education
Postsecondary Education
Descriptors: Undergraduate Students, Environmental Education, Problem Solving, Climate, Self Efficacy, Instructional Design, Values, Learning Motivation, Goal Orientation
DOI: 10.1080/13504622.2024.2374329
ISSN: 1350-4622
1469-5871
Abstract: Undergraduates often express that they feel powerless to help solve important challenges such as climate change and environmental degradation, consistent with the broader phenomena of ecoparalysis. Viewed through value-expectancy frameworks for motivation, value for an outcome and self-efficacy to achieve it lead to goals, which motivate engagement. This study evaluates the impact of a community-engaged course unit, versus a unit without a community-engaged component, in a general-education university environmental science course in the United States on student expressions of environmental value, self-efficacy, and goals. Qualitative analysis of written reflections reveals enhancements in students' pro-environmental values, environmental problem-solving self-efficacy, and environmentally-related goals. Paired quantitative analysis comparing code frequencies in reflections (n = 37) show statistically significant enhancements in environmental value (p = .00013, Cohen's d = 0.930) and self-efficacy (p = .00082, d = 0.807). These outcomes suggest community-engaged coursework can help reduce students' ecoparalysis and motivate them to engage in pro-environmental action beyond the bounds of the course.
Abstractor: As Provided
Entry Date: 2025
Accession Number: EJ1465048
Database: ERIC
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  Value: <anid>AN0183196933;eed01mar.25;2025Feb25.02:11;v2.2.500</anid> <title id="AN0183196933-1">Addressing ecoparalysis: a community-engaged unit enhances undergraduate student environmental value and problem-solving self-efficacy </title> <p>Undergraduates often express that they feel powerless to help solve important challenges such as climate change and environmental degradation, consistent with the broader phenomena of ecoparalysis. Viewed through value-expectancy frameworks for motivation, value for an outcome and self-efficacy to achieve it lead to goals, which motivate engagement. This study evaluates the impact of a community-engaged course unit, versus a unit without a community-engaged component, in a general-education university environmental science course in the United States on student expressions of environmental value, self-efficacy, and goals. Qualitative analysis of written reflections reveals enhancements in students' pro-environmental values, environmental problem-solving self-efficacy, and environmentally-related goals. Paired quantitative analysis comparing code frequencies in reflections (n = 37) show statistically significant enhancements in environmental value (p =.00013, Cohen's d = 0.930) and self-efficacy (p =.00082, d = 0.807). These outcomes suggest community-engaged coursework can help reduce students' ecoparalysis and motivate them to engage in pro-environmental action beyond the bounds of the course.</p> <p>Keywords: Community-engaged learning; motivation; value; self-efficacy; SDG 4: Quality education</p> <hd id="AN0183196933-2">Introduction</hd> <p>Today's university students are concerned about global crises like climate change and environmental degradation. In the 2020 Cambridge Global Perspectives survey of over 11,000 13- to 19-year-olds, 26% of respondents said 'climate change [is] the biggest issue facing the world today', followed by pollution and economic inequality—all of which are intertwined with environmental concerns. However, as individuals and non-experts, undergraduates often express feeling overwhelmed (Clayton and Manning [<reflink idref="bib15" id="ref1">15</reflink>]; Verlie [<reflink idref="bib53" id="ref2">53</reflink>]) and doubtful about their ability to have a meaningful impact on these problems (Albrecht [<reflink idref="bib3" id="ref3">3</reflink>]; Bostwick [<reflink idref="bib11" id="ref4">11</reflink>]; McKinnon [<reflink idref="bib34" id="ref5">34</reflink>]), sometimes leading them to take no action at all. This 'ecoparalysis' is an emerging global phenomena (Albrecht [<reflink idref="bib3" id="ref6">3</reflink>]), and individuals' lack of self-efficacy must be addressed to help equip and motivate citizens to tackle these existential challenges.</p> <p>While recent research has focused on alleviating ecoparalysis and related emotional distress in therapeutic settings (Ágoston et al. [<reflink idref="bib2" id="ref7">2</reflink>]; Innocenti et al. [<reflink idref="bib27" id="ref8">27</reflink>]), environmental education (both formal and informal) also has a role to play. For undergraduates enrolled in university, courses can be designed to teach content knowledge related to environmental challenges, help students overcome their sense of overwhelm, and foster the motivation that might lead them to engage in pro-environmental behaviors. Curricula for related majors, including geography, environmental science, political science, and others might consider how to achieve these outcomes over several years of instruction.</p> <p>However, not all students who are concerned about the environment or experience ecoparalysis select related majors, so general-enrollment classes play a crucial role in the educational ecosystem. In the U.S., most universities require all students to take at least one science course in order to graduate (Warner and Koeppel [<reflink idref="bib55" id="ref9">55</reflink>], e.g. Southern Association of Colleges and Schools [<reflink idref="bib48" id="ref10">48</reflink>]), which is where they are most likely to learn about topics like climate change (Hess and Collins [<reflink idref="bib25" id="ref11">25</reflink>]); in India, all university students must now complete a course on global warming (Niazi [<reflink idref="bib38" id="ref12">38</reflink>]). These general-education courses reach all undergraduates and face the challenge of equipping them with relevant skills and mindsets quickly, often in the span of just a semester.</p> <p>Maximizing the impact of individual courses requires evaluating the efficacy of instructional approaches for enhancing students' environmental motivation and reducing the likelihood they will be stymied by ecoparalysis. Indeed, in reviewing a wide range of definitions of environmental education and guidelines for curricular goals, Short identifies the use of 'sound, research-based, educational methodologies engaging learners as active participants' as a consistent feature of environmental education throughout 40 years of literature (Short [<reflink idref="bib47" id="ref13">47</reflink>], 8). Many different models have been explored, each offering unique benefits and drawbacks. Community-engaged learning is one such model which may foster environmental motivation, due to its ability to enhance students' value for content and their self-efficacy at using it to effect change.</p> <p>Community-engaged learning (variously referred to as service learning, community-based learning, and fair-trade learning, depending on nuances of implementation) refers to experiential course designs in which the faculty and students partner in some way with a local change-focused organization to address the needs of the community (after Jacoby [<reflink idref="bib28" id="ref14">28</reflink>], 1). The real-world context and applied problem-solving of community-engaged learning lend authenticity to the learning experience (Power [<reflink idref="bib42" id="ref15">42</reflink>]), and may help to close the motivation-action gap by giving students experience with models for taking action that they can draw upon in the future. Getting to know community members also humanizes the issue at hand for students and lends additional perceived value to the coursework (Jacoby [<reflink idref="bib28" id="ref16">28</reflink>]). Community-engaged learning has been associated with enhancements to students' academic learning and skill development, including critical thinking ability, understanding of course content, learning retention, and ability to apply theory to practice (Atkinson and Hunt [<reflink idref="bib5" id="ref17">5</reflink>]; Jacoby [<reflink idref="bib28" id="ref18">28</reflink>]; Mayer et al. [<reflink idref="bib32" id="ref19">32</reflink>]).</p> <p>As reviewed by Aarnio-Linnanvuori [<reflink idref="bib1" id="ref20">1</reflink>] '...empowerment is often connected to participatory methods and environmental action,' such as community-engaged designs. Student learning outcomes of community-engaged courses that are more closely tied to the desired outcomes of this study include personal and social responsibility, connections to the community, and increased engagement as citizens (Astin and Sax [<reflink idref="bib4" id="ref21">4</reflink>]; Gullion and Ellis [<reflink idref="bib24" id="ref22">24</reflink>]; Holtzman and Menning [<reflink idref="bib26" id="ref23">26</reflink>]; Jacoby [<reflink idref="bib28" id="ref24">28</reflink>]; Loh et al. [<reflink idref="bib31" id="ref25">31</reflink>]; Nkhoma [<reflink idref="bib39" id="ref26">39</reflink>]), as well as confidence and self-esteem (Eppler et al. [<reflink idref="bib22" id="ref27">22</reflink>]; Johnston [<reflink idref="bib29" id="ref28">29</reflink>]). Finally, students report that community-engaged learning encourages them to reflect on their own positionality within the community and confront privilege associated with their socioeconomic status, education, and other factors (Berard and Ravelli [<reflink idref="bib9" id="ref29">9</reflink>]).</p> <p>In this case study, we evaluate the impact of a community-engaged unit in an environmental science course at a U.S. University, relative to a unit without a community-engaged component. We investigate student expressions of environmental motivation, based in a values-expectancy framework for motivation (Eccles and Wigfield [<reflink idref="bib20" id="ref30">20</reflink>]). We hypothesize that engagement with a local water contamination crisis and with an organization involved in addressing that crisis will enhance students' environmental values, problem-solving self-efficacy related to environmental issues, and encourage them to set new pro-environmental goals, relative to a comparison unit. While not tested directly, these motivational enhancements, especially those related to self-efficacy, are hypothesized to play a critical role in encouraging environmental action and reducing ecoparalysis (Innocenti et al. [<reflink idref="bib27" id="ref31">27</reflink>]; Sawitri, Hadiyanto, and Hadi [<reflink idref="bib44" id="ref32">44</reflink>]).</p> <p>Below, we review the literature related to ecoparalysis and its emerging relationship to motivation, especially self-efficacy. Next, we consider value-expectancy theories of motivation in general and social cognitive theory's model of expectancy, contrast them with other theories used to predict pro-environmental behavior, and relate them to pro-environmental engagement and ecoparalysis. Finally, we unpack our theory of change, explicating the specific factors involved in the community-engaged unit that we hypothesize will lead to enhancements in student outcomes.</p> <hd id="AN0183196933-3">Understanding ecoparalysis</hd> <p>Ecoparalysis is an experience of helplessness and inability to take meaningful action due to the overwhelming scale and scope of environmental problems. As Moser puts it, '...what could we as individuals do about it anyway? The problem is too big, too complicated, too overwhelming—it's hopeless' (Moser [<reflink idref="bib37" id="ref33">37</reflink>], 65). Ecoparalysis is one of a series of negative psychological conditions related to climate change and environmental degradation (Albrecht [<reflink idref="bib3" id="ref34">3</reflink>]; Usher, Durkin, and Bhullar [<reflink idref="bib52" id="ref35">52</reflink>]). Others include eco-anxiety, a condition of emotional distress and fear about environmental degradation and how it may impact our lives and futures (Albrecht [<reflink idref="bib3" id="ref36">3</reflink>]; Clayton et al. [<reflink idref="bib16" id="ref37">16</reflink>]); eco-guilt, a sense of culpability for the impacts of individual and collective behaviors on the environment (Ágoston et al. [<reflink idref="bib2" id="ref38">2</reflink>]); and solastalgia, emotional distress resulting from observing the destruction or dramatic change of the natural environments we call home due to phenomena like climate change, natural disasters, and industrialization (Albrecht [<reflink idref="bib3" id="ref39">3</reflink>]).</p> <p>The relationships among these 'psychoterratic syndromes' (Albrecht [<reflink idref="bib3" id="ref40">3</reflink>]), and a full understanding of what drives the phenomena of ecoparalysis, is emerging through current research. For example, Ágoston et al. ([<reflink idref="bib2" id="ref41">2</reflink>]) identify aspects consistent with ecoparalysis within both eco-anxiety (helplessness and frustration) and eco-guilt (uncertainty about our impacts, called 'dilemma of harm') typologies. Innocenti et al. ([<reflink idref="bib27" id="ref42">27</reflink>]) investigated the mediating effect of self-efficacy on the relationship between eco-anxiety and engagement in pro-environmental behaviors (PEB). They found that individuals with higher global self-efficacy were more likely to respond to eco-anxiety by engaging in PEB (Innocenti et al. [<reflink idref="bib27" id="ref43">27</reflink>]), rather than becoming mired in ecoparalysis. Relatedly, Ágoston et al. ([<reflink idref="bib2" id="ref44">2</reflink>]) noted that problem-focused coping (taking actions and planning) was among the most adaptive responses to negative eco-emotional states. These outcomes suggest that course designs like community-engaged learning, which directly engage and support students as they learn to plan and take part in pro-environmental actions, may be of particular value to reducing ecoparalysis.</p> <hd id="AN0183196933-4">Value-expectancy theories of motivation</hd> <p>Self-efficacy, explored in the study above by Innocenti and colleagues, is one of a network of constructs involved in value-expectancy theories of motivation (Eccles and Wigfield [<reflink idref="bib20" id="ref45">20</reflink>]). In particular, self-efficacy features strongly in social-cognitive theory (Bandura [<reflink idref="bib8" id="ref46">8</reflink>]), a theoretical framework recently put forward to offer additional value in understanding environmental behavior (Sawitri, Hadiyanto, and Hadi [<reflink idref="bib44" id="ref47">44</reflink>]). In this framework, outcome expectancies (beliefs about whether completing a task will lead to a desired outcome) and self-efficacy (beliefs about how capable one is of completing that task) lead individuals to set goals that direct their behavior (Bandura [<reflink idref="bib8" id="ref48">8</reflink>]). In an environmental behavior context, Sawitri, Hadiyanto, and Hadi ([<reflink idref="bib44" id="ref49">44</reflink>]) note that relative to commonly applied frameworks like the Theory of Planned Behavior (Ajzen and Fishbein 1980; Azjen [<reflink idref="bib6" id="ref50">6</reflink>]; Fishbein and Azjen [<reflink idref="bib21" id="ref51">21</reflink>]), Norm Activation Theory (Schwartz [<reflink idref="bib45" id="ref52">45</reflink>], [<reflink idref="bib46" id="ref53">46</reflink>]), and Values-Beliefs-Norms Theory (Stern [<reflink idref="bib50" id="ref54">50</reflink>]), social cognitive theory emphasizes the personal agency of individuals in decision-making. Attending to one's freedom of choice and ability to self-regulate their actions may help to enhance understanding of pro-environmental behavior at the individual level (Sawitri, Hadiyanto, and Hadi [<reflink idref="bib44" id="ref55">44</reflink>]).</p> <p>Social cognitive theory's focus on self-efficacy seems particularly crucial to understanding how to help individuals overcome eco-paralysis (see Innocenti et al. [<reflink idref="bib27" id="ref56">27</reflink>]). According to Bandura ([<reflink idref="bib8" id="ref57">8</reflink>]), four primary factors help to enhance an individual's self-efficacy beliefs in a given domain or type of task: Mastery experiences in which one successfully engages in the type of task are likely to be most effective at enhancing self-efficacy in that domain. However, vicarious experiences in which the individual observes someone else successfully engage in that type of task and verbal persuasion in which someone else encourages the belief that one could be successful may also enhance one's self-efficacy beliefs. Finally, physiological states such as low mood or exhaustion can also influence one's moment-to-moment self-efficacy perceptions (Bandura [<reflink idref="bib8" id="ref58">8</reflink>]).</p> <p>While social cognitive theory addresses many motivational elements (goals, outcome expectancies, efficacy expectancies), it fails to answer the question of <emph>why</emph> one might want to achieve a particular goal in the first place, which depends upon one's values. Different existing theories of pro-environmental behavior center different types of values, such an individual's attitudes toward a particular pro-environmental behavior (Theory of Planned Behavior), personal norms or altruistic motives (Norm Activation Theory), or a wider set of personal values (Values-Beliefs-Norms Theory) (Sawitri, Hadiyanto, and Hadi [<reflink idref="bib44" id="ref59">44</reflink>]). Educational theories of motivation posit attainment value (satisfaction from mastery of a task or achievement of a goal), intrinsic value (enjoyment of the task itself), and instrumental value (the degree to which an activity or goal furthers one's other goals) as driving factors behind goal-setting and motivation (Wigfield and Eccles [<reflink idref="bib56" id="ref60">56</reflink>], [<reflink idref="bib57" id="ref61">57</reflink>]).</p> <p>Taken together, pro-environmental values coupled with positive outcome expectancies (especially self-efficacy) around environmental problem-solving may lead individuals to set more pro-environmental goals. Goals have elsewhere been shown to increase the likelihood that individuals will engage in the stated behavior (Deci and Ryan [<reflink idref="bib18" id="ref62">18</reflink>]), though this link is mediated by a wide range of circumstantial and personal factors. On the whole, new environmental goals set by students should enhance the likelihood that they will engage in environmental action, rather than being inhibited by the experience of ecoparalysis.</p> <hd id="AN0183196933-5">Theory of change</hd> <p>In our theory of change (illustrated in Figure 1), we draw upon both social cognitive theory and the construct of values (in various forms) to hypothesize that the place-based, community-engaged course unit will have additional benefits over and above a course unit without those design features. In the community-engaged unit, students engage in a mastery experience through the authentic unit project (creating educational materials to be disseminated by the community partners), significantly enhancing their self-efficacy. Through vicarious experience listening to the community partners describe their work and its impact, and verbal persuasion from the community partners in the form of feedback on their projects, their self-efficacy to engage with environmental problem-solving will be further enhanced.</p> <p>PHOTO (COLOR): Figure 1. Theory of change tested in this study, based on value-expectancy frameworks of motivation.</p> <p>While we hypothesize that the intervention will have greater impacts on self-efficacy, and that (based on the findings of Innocenti et al. [<reflink idref="bib27" id="ref63">27</reflink>]) self-efficacy is likely to play a greater role in overcoming ecoparalysis and encouraging PEB, we anticipate that the intervention will also enhance students pro-environmental values. First, instruction and exploration of the ways in which the health and wellbeing of people in the affected community are impacted by the contamination, and the degree to which that impact reflects and exacerbates entrenched societal inequities, will evoke altruistic or prosocial norms. Additionally, the local setting of the impacted community will encourage students' instrumental value for the knowledge, as physical proximity to the problem encourages them to consider their own possible health outcomes.</p> <hd id="AN0183196933-6">Materials and methods</hd> <p></p> <hd id="AN0183196933-7">Study population and setting</hd> <p>This case study was conducted in two iterations (spring 2021 and fall 2022) of a three-credit-hour, 14-week Introduction to Environmental Science course at a private mid-sized liberal arts university in the southeastern U.S. The first author was the course instructor. The spring 2021 iteration of the course enrolled 29 undergraduate students, and fall 2022 enrolled 30. Students were predominantly 18–22 years old, and spanned across all four years of their college careers: 25.4% were in their first year of college study, 35.6% were in their second, 32.2% in their third, and only 6.8% were in their fourth year of college study. Like the institution, students who identified as female (57.6%) outnumbered students who identified as male (40.7%) or nonbinary (1.7%). Only 1 of the 59 students in these two semesters identified as a person of color. Students come from across the U.S. (and occasionally the world) to study at our university, and based on the first author's conversations with the students, most were from outside the Southeastern region; only a few were from our state, and none mentioned being from the community studied in the community-engaged unit.</p> <p>23.7% of students enrolled in the course expressed an intent to major or minor in environmental studies. The remaining 76.3% enrolled to fulfill the university's core curriculum requirements while pursuing a wide array of majors in our university's school of business (including finance and marketing), school of communications (including cinema & television arts, journalism, and sport management), school of education (including elementary education, middle grades education, and outdoor leadership and education), and school of arts & sciences (including biology, English, human service studies, psychology, political science, and public health). Some participating students had not declared a major course of study by the time that they enrolled in the Introduction to Environmental Science class.</p> <p>Students were encouraged, but not required, to participate in the study. All students completed the Learning Reflection and Self-Evaluation worksheets as part of the summative assessment process at the end of each unit, but no extra credit was offered to incentivize students to participate in the study. To consent as study participants, students submitted an online form managed and maintained by the second author, as approved by our university's institutional review board (ID: 21–137). 21 students from the first semester (72.4% of those enrolled) and 19 from the second semester (63.3%) agreed to allow us to analyze their responses, yielding 40 participants in total across the two semesters.</p> <hd id="AN0183196933-8">Instructional design</hd> <p>This course was designed around several core learning objectives, displayed in Table 1. The first week of the course is devoted to community-building and goal-setting activities. The remaining 13 wk are divided into three units: Unit 1 (5 wk), 'Carbon, Climate, and Energy,' utilized active learning to examine the science and societal impacts of climate change on a global scale. Unit 2 (5 wk), 'What's in the Water' (focused on drinking water contamination), utilized active learning with a community-engaged focus: Students engage with leaders of a community-based advocacy organization from a nearby town impacted by a water contamination crisis, and complete their final project in service to that organization's goals. Unit 3 (3 wk) allowed students to choose from a set of environmental and environmental justice books to read in groups. Student reflections from the end of Unit 1 and Unit 2 are the dataset for this study; Unit 3 is not included in the study and is not described further. An overview of Unit 1 and Unit 2 lessons and team project steps are provided in Figure 2.</p> <p>Graph: Figure 2. Timeline of lessons and project steps in Unit 1 and Unit 2.</p> <p>Table 1. Course learning objectives.</p> <p> <ephtml> <table><tbody valign="top"><tr><td>Identify your values and goals and how this course helps you live into or achieve them.</td></tr><tr><td>Explain the scientific process and engage in it by analyzing and exploring data in many forms.</td></tr><tr><td>Describe and illustrate the cycling of matter and energy over space and time and explain how humans engage these cycles.</td></tr><tr><td>Understand and use basic environmental science vocabulary and effectively explain key terms and concepts to non-specialists.</td></tr><tr><td>Design environmental solutions that integrate scientific, behavioral, economic, cultural, political, and ethical considerations.</td></tr></tbody></table> </ephtml> </p> <hd id="AN0183196933-9">Unit 1: carbon, Climate, and Energy</hd> <p>A timeline for Unit 1: Carbon, Climate, and Energy is illustrated in Figure 2. Students engaged in individual and collaborative tasks intended to help them understand and explain carbon's role in life and the storage of energy through photosynthesis, the role fossil fuels play in driving climate change, and its impact on people around the world. For homework, students read popular science articles or watched videos and wrote down key takeaways. In class, groups worked together to analyze graphs and charts, search for additional reliable sources, synthesize ideas, and share findings. The instructor's role was to stress key emerging ideas, address questions and misconceptions, help students evaluate sources, and use occasional mini-lectures (10–15 min) to elaborate on ideas and help students connect concepts across lessons. Throughout the unit, teams worked on an end-of-unit project to learn about a renewable energy source or a geoengineering approach to mitigating climate change and translate that information for other students at the university (e.g. infographics, short videos, podcasts, etc.). Students gave one another feedback and revised their projects prior to instructor grading.</p> <p>At the end of the unit, students completed a Learning Reflection and Self-Evaluation in which they described the concepts or ideas that stuck out most to them and how their thinking had changed, especially relative to questions they had at the beginning of the unit and the course learning objectives. This worksheet also asked if and how they had made progress toward their own goals, how they used their strengths, and how they challenged themselves along the way. Subsequently, the worksheet asked students to set goals for the upcoming unit.</p> <hd id="AN0183196933-10">Unit 2: what's in the Water?</hd> <p>A timeline of activities in Unit 2: What's in the Water? is illustrated Figure 2. Unit 2 explored a local water contamination crisis in which PFAS (per- and poly-fluorinated substances) are being discharged at high levels from our local wastewater treatment plant and subsequently detected in dangerous concentrations in drinking water in a town downstream. PFAS are a class of synthetic chemicals used for a wide variety of industrial products and pocesses (Glüge et al. [<reflink idref="bib23" id="ref64">23</reflink>]) that do not break down naturally in the environment (Cousins et al. [<reflink idref="bib17" id="ref65">17</reflink>]), are expensive and challenging to remove <emph>via</emph> or remediate in municipal water systems processes (Wanninayake [<reflink idref="bib54" id="ref66">54</reflink>]), and have been linked to numerous adverse health outcomes for humans and wildlife (Panieri et al. [<reflink idref="bib41" id="ref67">41</reflink>]). Lessons in this unit utilized a similar active-learning design to Unit 1, toggling between individual assignments, small group discussion and collaborative problem-solving, and whole-class sharing and discussion (Table 2). Lessons explored scientific concepts such as watersheds, natural and urban water cycles, and the health effects of PFAS on humans and other animals, as well as societal correlates like the economic costs of different filtration technologies and the inequities in drinking water safety and access in the U.S. All Unit 2 lessons and materials have been published on Teach the Earth, and are linked from the Unit Description (Merricks & Bitting, n.d.).</p> <p>Table 2. Pedagogical elements in each unit.</p> <p> <ephtml> <table><thead><tr><td>Pedagogical elements</td><td>Unit 1</td><td>Unit 2</td></tr></thead><tbody valign="top"><tr><td>Unit introduction</td><td>Instructor overview</td><td>Instructor overview + community partner visit</td></tr><tr><td>Team project proposal</td><td>Feedback from instructor</td><td>Feedback from instructor + community partner</td></tr><tr><td>Formative homework assignments</td><td>Yes</td><td>Yes</td></tr><tr><td>Daily, collaborative in-class activities</td><td>Yes</td><td>Yes</td></tr><tr><td>Instructor feedback and mini-lectures</td><td>Yes</td><td>Yes</td></tr><tr><td>Team-based project</td><td>Audience: other students</td><td>Audience: downstream town citizens</td></tr><tr><td>Feedback and project revision</td><td>Feedback from peers</td><td>Feedback from community partner</td></tr><tr><td>Learning Reflection & Self-Evaluation</td><td>Yes</td><td>Yes</td></tr><tr><td>Partial "ungrading" approach</td><td>Yes</td><td>Yes</td></tr></tbody></table> </ephtml> </p> <p>The primary difference between Unit 1 and Unit 2 is the community partnership with Clean Haw River in Unit 2 (Table 2). Clean Haw River is a community-based advocacy organization located in the downstream town experiencing PFAS contamination in their drinking water in concentrations far above the national average (Kotlarz et al. [<reflink idref="bib30" id="ref68">30</reflink>]). The second author of this paper is one of two founders of Clean Haw River. The co-founders both lived in the town and their families were exposed to the town's drinking water. Both founders visited the class at the beginning of Unit 2 to provide context on the issue, describe their personal stories and their organization's advocacy work, and highlight ways students' projects could help advance the organization's mission. Throughout the unit, teams were working to create advocacy materials to be disseminated by Clean Haw River to the public. Similar to Unit 1, these projects were usually infographics, brochures, or short videos. At the end of Unit 2, the Clean Haw River founders visited the class to view the project presentations and provide feedback on the student projects. Teams then revised their materials and resubmitted them for use by Clean Haw River, and grading by the instructor. Due to logistical limitations involved in travel, engagement with the affected community was exclusively <emph>via</emph> students' interactions with the Clean Haw River founders, whose aims were to advocate for their diverse community of town water users.</p> <p>As in Unit 1, students also completed a Learning Reflection and Self-Evaluation worksheet (hereafter, 'reflection' or 'reflection worksheet') at the end of Unit 2. This reflection worksheet was identical to the Unit 1 worksheet with the exception of one additional hypothetical question that asked students to imagine themselves as a resident of the impacted town (in reality, none were) and to identify what their biggest takeaways would be, what recommendations they might make to the town government, and what actions they might take. Pedagogical elements of Unit 1 and Unit 2 are summarized and contrasted in Table 2.</p> <hd id="AN0183196933-11">Study design and analysis</hd> <p>To compare the relative impact of each unit's instructional approach on students' learning, we coded their end-of-unit reflections from Units 1 and 2. To avoid bias on the part of the first author and primary instructor, the second author removed all identifying information on the reflection worksheets and replaced names with numerical identifiers. To ensure an equal number of opportunities for codes to be applied to student responses in each unit, we eliminated reflections from the dataset if the student failed to answer more than one question on either worksheet. This reduced our dataset to 37 paired sets of reflection worksheets for analysis (74 assignments in total).</p> <p>Based on the theory of change illustrated in Figure 1, we developed and iteratively refined a coding scheme for indicators aligned with students' underlying sense of value for addressing environmental and coupled environmental-social issues (e.g. environmental justice, environmental health), their sense of self-efficacy for doing something to engage with or help mitigate them, and any new goals related to the environment and coupled environmental-social phenomena expressed by students. Environmental/social value was coded for statements that identified the importance of an environmental or coupled environmental-social issue, as well as for statements in which students expressed a desire or intent to pursue action in uncertain language (e.g. 'I would like to...'). Self-efficacy was coded for statements in which students stated a planned, intended, or completed action to address an environmental or intertwined environmental/social issue using certain language (e.g. 'I can...' or 'I will...'). We also coded for self-efficacy when students used conditional language ('would,' 'could') for the hypothetical Unit 2 question, since the question itself was framed in conditional terms ('If you were a [town] resident...'). Changes in goals were coded when students explicitly noted a new or changed goal related to environmental or intertwined environmental/social issues.</p> <p>Since worksheets prompted reflection about both course content and learning processes, we also looked for indicators of value, self-efficacy, and new goals for study or learning behaviors. Since we did not hypothesize that motivational components related to study or learning behaviors would be altered by the community-based unit, this data served as a way to check whether students' broader values and self-efficacy might be changing over time, independently from targeted instructional interventions.</p> <p>For both sets of value and self-efficacy codes, we included a 'conditional' code version, in which students expressed similar sentiments but framed them as being driven primarily by the course or an assignment therein.</p> <p>We recorded only one code instance per question on the worksheet to ensure that students who wrote longer answers were not over-represented in the final analysis. If a student response to a question was coded for both value and 'conditional' value, only the value code was recorded, reflecting their firmest expression of that sentiment. On the Unit 2 learning reflection, which had one added question, codes for the added question were combined with codes for the first question about what students learned, and duplicate codes from those two questions were removed. This ensured an equal number of opportunities for students to express values and expectancies in each unit's reflection.</p> <p>Initially, both authors coded each reflection and compared codes to resolve discrepancies. Once we achieved a consistent inter-rater reliability score above 80%, we divided the remaining reflections, asking for a second opinion from one another as needed.</p> <p>For statistical analysis, since conditional codes were relatively rare (3 total for value and 6 total for self-efficacy), they were combined with the primary codes. Code occurrences for value and self-efficacy in each domain (environmental, learning) were evaluated for normal distribution to inform selection of appropriate statistical tests. Codes related to learning (both value and self-efficacy) were approximately normally distributed, so the number of codes in Unit 1 (comparison) and Unit 2 (intervention) were compared using a within-subjects t-test. Codes related to the environment, both value and self-efficacy, were skewed toward the low end, with the greatest number of students expressing no statements associated with either code. Therefore, code occurrences related to the environment were compared across Unit 1 and Unit 2 using a Mann-Whitney U test, which does not require data to be normally distributed. The threshold for statistical significance was set at.05, and Cohen's <emph>d</emph> was calculated to determine the effect size of the difference between the two units. Text representing new goals were compiled to look for themes in each unit, but were not compared statistically due to the small number of corresponding codes.</p> <hd id="AN0183196933-12">Results</hd> <p></p> <hd id="AN0183196933-13">Environmental motivation components</hd> <p></p> <hd id="AN0183196933-14">Value</hd> <p>Students frequently expressed perceptions of value related to environmental, or coupled environmental-social issues, with phrasing such as 'I want to...,' 'I value...,' or 'I think it's important to...' For example, after completing the community-engaged unit, one participant wrote, 'I personally want to be able to discuss what to do to fix this issue to other people so some change can be started...' Another participant connected the values they expressed in their goal-setting assignment to their experience within unit 2, stating, 'One of my values... was dedication to problem solving which I feel like will be effective in helping me and my group find effective solutions to combat environmental racism.' Students sometimes expressed value coded as 'conditional' by preceding and statement with conditional language, such as framing the unit or a class activity as the driving force behind it: 'This unit also made me feel motivated to get more involved in actions and organizations around campus that have a goal of having a positive impact on the world.'</p> <p>Participating students also wrote six statements explicitly expressing new values developed as a result of the class: One after Unit 1, and the remaining after Unit 2. The statement written after Unit 1 focused on conservation of natural resources: 'However, after learning about carbon I have started valuing the health of the environment. After learning about how much human activites impact the carbon cycle, I have begun to stretch my value of health to include the environment. Valuing the environment is important as it is the foundation for life and it has limited resources that we continue to deplete daily.'</p> <p>All five statements written after Unit 2 focused on a newfound value for environmental justice and equity. For example, once participant commented, 'This unit really opened my eyes to how much I am not okay with the environmental inequality in our country and even in our area. I care a lot about these issues...' Another wrote the following: 'Honestly, I am starting to care more and more about the harsh realities that many people live in. More needs to be done and I am going to try my hardest to advocate for many individuals that are impacted by environmental injustice.'</p> <p>In their Unit 1 reflections, the 37 participating students wrote a total of 52 statements expressing value for addressing environmental or coupled environmental-social issues (average 1.41 per student, standard deviation 1.07, one conditional code), as shown in Figure 3. In contrast, the students expressed value for solving environmental/social issues 93 times in their Unit 2 reflections (average 2.51, standard deviation 1.30, two conditional codes). A one-tailed Mann-Whitney U-test showed significantly more expressions of value after Unit 2 than after Unit 1, z = –3.659, <emph>p</emph> =.00013, with a large effect size (Cohen's <emph>d</emph>) of 0.930 (Figure 3).</p> <p>Graph: Figure 3. Code occurrences, results of two-tailed t-tests, and effect size for each environmental variable. Statistically significant results at the p <.05 level are marked with *, and results significant at the p <.001 level are marked with **. "conditional" code occurrences are shown at the top of the respective bars.</p> <hd id="AN0183196933-15">Self-efficacy</hd> <p>Students expressed self-efficacy around environmental problem-solving by stating planned or intended actions. For example, one participant noted, 'When you are staying somewhere, whether you live there or just visiting, you should research the area and the water quality.' For the hypothetical questions about what students would do if they were residents of the affected town, their language mirrored the hypothetical nature of the question but still expressed agency around actions they could take in that situation: 'there are ways for people to help like, reaching out to local government officials and state representatives about PFAS regulations, advocating to prevent contamination from upstream...' Another stated, 'I would advocate for companies being forced to test their chemicals and... I would pressure my local government into implementing systems that address the issue.'</p> <p>In their Unit 1 reflection, students wrote only 14 statements expressing self-efficacy or self-efficacy to take action to resolve environmental or environmental-social issues, (average 0.38, standard deviation 0.64, two conditional codes; Figure 2). This increased to 37 after Unit 2 (average 1.00, standard deviation 0.88, four weak codes). A one-tailed Mann-Whitney U-test showed significantly more expressions of self-efficacy after Unit 2, z = –3.146, <emph>p</emph> =.00082, with a large effect size (Cohen's <emph>d</emph>) of 0.807 (Figure 3).</p> <hd id="AN0183196933-16">Goals</hd> <p>In total, the 37 students wrote only seven new goals related to the environment or coupled environmental-social issues: two after Unit 1, and five after Unit 2. Of those, four were career-related. For example, after Unit 1 one participant stated the following: 'I guess one way I could say that I stretched myself is that I now know that I want to work in the environmental field. Whether it is from the business side or the legal side I want to be on the front lines of eradicating the excess carbon from our atmosphere to stop climate change.' While most new career goals focused on advancing positive environmental change, one simply focused on mitigating harm: 'I would like to get a professional career that isn't involved in any harmful practices that hurt the environment.'</p> <p>Two goals were related to engaging in activism or seeking solutions as a citizen. One was set after Unit 1: 'I also think to add to those goals I want to contribute to real actions that I believe to have a positive impact on the environment through creative solutions.' The other followed Unit 2, and combined career and activism together: 'My goal for this unit is to incorporate environmental activism not only in my everyday life, but in my future career goals.'</p> <p>The final goal was related to better understanding the science of environmental-social issues following Unit 2: 'I also think I have added the goal to understand science more than I have in the past especially when it comes to environmental issue that affect everyday life.'</p> <hd id="AN0183196933-17">Learning motivation components</hd> <p></p> <hd id="AN0183196933-18">Value</hd> <p>Students frequently expressed value for learning or specific study behaviors by explaining why they were useful to them. For example, one participant said, 'I have become more patient because I get the answer wrong a lot, but I also want to build a stronger thought process which will help me more...' Occasionally, they also valued certain learning or study behaviors because they enjoyed them: 'I also enjoy problem solving which is what we have been working through over the past couple months.' Similar to values expressed related to the environment that were coded as conditional, students sometimes wrote about how the class or its activities drove them to adopt a particular learning-related value: 'The project we were given this unit was great towards being able to find informative and reliable sources on our own.'</p> <p>There were a total of 219 statements expressing value for specific learning or study behaviors (average 5.92 per student, standard deviation 2.06, one conditional code) in Unit 1 reflections, as shown in Figure 3. Similarly, they expressed value for those behaviors 226 times in their Unit 2 reflections (average 6.11, standard deviation 2.18, no conditional codes). A within-subjects two-tailed t-test showed no significant difference (<emph>t</emph><bold></bold>=<bold></bold>0.499, <emph>p</emph> =.621, <emph>d</emph><bold></bold>=<bold></bold>0.09; Figure 4).</p> <p>Graph: Figure 4. Code occurrences, results of two-tailed t-tests, and effect size for learning value and self-efficacy codes. "conditional" code occurrences are shown at the top of the respective bars. No statistically significant differences were observed.</p> <hd id="AN0183196933-19">Self-efficacy</hd> <p>Particularly in the goal-setting portion of each end-of-unit reflection, students frequently expressed planned or intended learning or study actions in clear and certain terms that indicated a strong sense of self-efficacy. For example, one said 'I will bring my positive communication skills, increased knowledge in the field, and also my hard work.' Conditional expressions, as with environmental problem-solving self-efficacy, were rhetorically framed as being driven primarily by the course: '...when we switched our in-class groups for the day... it allowed me to go out of my comfort zone and speak with people I am not comfortable with.'</p> <p>The 37 participating students expressed self-efficacy around specific learning or study behaviors 196 times in the Unit 1 worksheet (average 5.30, standard deviation 1.84, 10 weak codes), and 207 times in the Unit 2 worksheet (average 5.59, standard deviation 2.35, 19 weak codes), with no significant difference between the units (<emph>t</emph><bold></bold>=<bold></bold>1.09, <emph>p</emph> =.284, <emph>d</emph><bold></bold>=<bold></bold>0.141; Figure 4).</p> <hd id="AN0183196933-20">Goals</hd> <p>Students wrote a total of 13 explicit new goals related to learning and study behavior, 9 after Unit 1 and 4 after Unit 2 (one ostensibly 'new' goal was repeated word-for-word after unit 2 and was not included in the code count) (Figure 4). These varied widely, from enhancing collaboration to increasing participation and focusing on a variety of academic skillsets. A few examples are as follows:</p> <p></p> <ulist> <item> 'On top of that, during unit 2 I would really like to work on my teamwork with group members, and always being on top of the work we have as a group, always putting out the best product or presentation possible.' (after Unit 1)</item> <p></p> <item> 'I would like to now shift my skills into having better note-taking, research, and critical thinking skills.' (after Unit 1)</item> <p></p> <item> 'One new skill I want to improve is team leadership, trying to take more of a lead on the end project than just sitting back and going with the flow.' (after Unit 2)</item> <p></p> <item> 'I biggest way I would like to challenge myself during this unit is being sure to reread sections of the book that I don't understand. Typically, if I read through something and do not fully get it, I wil [sic] move on and then hopefuly [sic] understand it through class discussions. During this unit, I am going to try to come to class each day with some ideas on what I read in the previous few days.' (after Unit 2)</item> </ulist> <p>The content or focus of new learning-related goals did not vary systematically in comparing the two units to each other.</p> <hd id="AN0183196933-21">Study limitations</hd> <p>This study was conducted at a private, primarily undergraduate, predominantly white university in the southeastern U.S. The two semesters of the course examined here enrolled only one student of color, and other demographic data such as socioeconomic status, first-generation college student status, ability/disability status, or veteran status were not available with which to characterize our study population. Therefore, our results may not be generalizable to other institution types (e.g. large research universities, community colleges, historically Black colleges and universities or other minority-serving institutions), more diverse populations, or other countries. Further testing of the community-engaged model in additional contexts, taught by other instructors, would also add value by increasing the sample size of student responses beyond the initial 37 students studied here.</p> <p>The data collection instrument for this study (Learning Reflection and Self-Evaluation worksheet) also served as a learning prompt and end-of-unit assessment instrument, which was convenient for instructional purposes, but may have limited the degree to which we could accurately detect changes in students' beliefs. We did not directly ask students whether their sense of environmental value or problem-solving self-efficacy had changed, but rather sought indicators of those changes in their writing about their learning more broadly. Similarly, we did not directly prompt students to reflect on the impacts of the community engagement features (shown in Figure 1) that we hypothesized would influence student outcomes. Future work might pair this strategy with an established instrument such as the 2-MEV (Bogner and Wiseman [<reflink idref="bib10" id="ref69">10</reflink>]), EAI (Milfont and Duckitt [<reflink idref="bib36" id="ref70">36</reflink>]), or SPACS-Q (Olsson et al. [<reflink idref="bib40" id="ref71">40</reflink>]) to triangulate changes in these qualities and evaluate how different types of instruments reveal them.</p> <p>Our approach to coding student responses was designed for this study. We recognize that instruments used across studies may have greater cross-contextual value and therefore produce higher-value results (St. John and McNeal [<reflink idref="bib49" id="ref72">49</reflink>]), but we were unable to locate established reflection templates or rubrics that would be easily adapted to our purpose. Therefore, our reflection template and rubric may not generalize well to other course contexts or research studies.</p> <p>Finally, due to the short-term nature of this study, we were unable to test the final linkage in our theory of change in which goals translate to reduced ecoparalysis and increased engagement in pro-environmental actions. A longitudinal design tracking these outcomes after students complete the course would be necessary to evaluate whether the motivational outcomes studied here do, as hypothesized, lead to the ultimate desired outcomes.</p> <hd id="AN0183196933-22">Discussion</hd> <p></p> <hd id="AN0183196933-23">Motivational outcomes of community-engaged learning</hd> <p>As articulated in our theory of change (Figure 1), we anticipated that the community-engaged unit (Unit 2) would yield additional benefits for several components of motivation. We anticipated that students' environmental problem-solving self-efficacy would be enhanced by their mastery experience of creating environmental educational materials for the community organization, by their vicarious experience of hearing about community partners' prior successes, and by verbal persuasion as community partners gave positive feedback on students' project work and its value to advancing the organization's mission. We hypothesized that students' environmental values would also be enhanced <emph>via</emph> altruistic or prosocial values related community health and equity, and that the local setting would encourage students to consider the instrumental value of the knowledge and experience they were gaining for protecting their own health. Finally, as a result of enhancements in students' environmental values and self-efficacy, we hypothesized that they would form additional pro-environmental goals after participating in Unit 2. These outcomes were sought due to their theoretical impact on reducing ecoparalysis and increasing students' likelihood of engaging in pro-environmental behavior, though these variables were not tested.</p> <p>In our analysis, students expressed more environmental value and problem-solving self-efficacy, and set more pro-environmental goals after Unit 2 compared to Unit 1, suggesting that the community-engaged unit did enhance student motivation to solve environmental problems to a greater degree than the comparison unit. These findings are well-aligned with congruent outcomes for community-engaged courses (Astin and Sax [<reflink idref="bib4" id="ref73">4</reflink>]; Eppler et al. [<reflink idref="bib22" id="ref74">22</reflink>]; Gullion and Ellis [<reflink idref="bib24" id="ref75">24</reflink>]; Holtzman and Menning [<reflink idref="bib26" id="ref76">26</reflink>]; Jacoby [<reflink idref="bib28" id="ref77">28</reflink>]; Johnston [<reflink idref="bib29" id="ref78">29</reflink>]; Loh et al. [<reflink idref="bib31" id="ref79">31</reflink>]; Nkhoma [<reflink idref="bib39" id="ref80">39</reflink>]), and suggest that some degree of change in motivational components can be achieved even in the span of a single unit (1/3 of the duration of the course). Those similar shifts over time were not observed for learning value, self-efficacy, and goals (even though the instrument was created to guide reflection on both content and learning process), indicating that motivational enhancements are unique to the environmental aspect of the course.</p> <p>Contrary to our hypothesis, code frequencies suggest that students' value for the environment and solving coupled social-environmental issues was enhanced substantially more than was their related self-efficacy. All student expressions of newfound personal values after Unit 2 were related to environmental justice and equity, suggesting that prosocial or altruistic values were triggered by the intervention, as suggested in our theory of change. This data also aligns with Berard and Ravelli's ([<reflink idref="bib9" id="ref81">9</reflink>]) finding that students developed greater awareness of their positionality and privilege as a result of a community-engaged course.</p> <p>Supporting our theory of change for instrumental value, students occasionally commented on the local aspect of the community-engaged unit and, by extension, the potential that they could also be affected. For example, one student commented, 'I have always been fortunate enough to have access to clean drinking water and the fact that a city only about 15 min away doesn't just goes to show how much inequality there is even in places you wouldn't expect.' Another said, 'It is scary to think that the people around me could be affected by [the contamination] and how badly they can be affected such as developing cancer, children having problems, pregnant women having complications, etc.' (This final quote seems to speak to both the local/instrumental and prosocial values of the writer.)</p> <p>Statements coded for environmental problem-solving self-efficacy are relatively rare compared to expressions of environmental value in both units. The relative rarity with which students express a sense of their ability to solve environmental problems may align with prior literature suggesting students find these problems important (Cambridge Global Perspectives Survey n.d.) but overwhelming and intractable (Albrecht [<reflink idref="bib3" id="ref82">3</reflink>]; Clayton [<reflink idref="bib14" id="ref83">14</reflink>]; Clayton and Manning [<reflink idref="bib15" id="ref84">15</reflink>]; Moser [<reflink idref="bib37" id="ref85">37</reflink>]; Verlie [<reflink idref="bib53" id="ref86">53</reflink>]). That the ratio narrows somewhat after Unit 2, and that there are significantly more expressions of problem-solving self-efficacy after Unit 2 than Unit 1 (<emph>p</emph> = 0.00082, <emph>d</emph><bold></bold>=<bold></bold>0.807, Figure 3) suggests that community-engaged work may help to assuage students' sense of 'ecoparalysis' (Albrecht [<reflink idref="bib3" id="ref87">3</reflink>]; Clayton [<reflink idref="bib14" id="ref88">14</reflink>]), though it does not fully resolve it. In the reflective writing samples we examined, students did not frame their expressions of self-efficacy in terms of what prompted it, and we did not prompt them to do so, prohibiting us from determining the degree of impact related to each of the three factors posited in the theory of change (mastery experience, vicarious experience, or verbal persuasion, after Bandura [<reflink idref="bib8" id="ref89">8</reflink>]). Future studies leveraging interviews or more targeted reflection prompts should seek to elucidate their relative influence within community-engaged course components.</p> <p>While coding, we distinguished 'conditional' versions of value and self-efficacy related to both the environment and learning because their framing was striking to us as instructors. In some ways, these expressions distanced the students rhetorically from the value or self-efficacy by framing the course, unit, or activity as requiring or guiding them into those beliefs. On the one hand, this framing might be interpreted as explicit evidence that students develop value and self-efficacy as a direct result of the learning activities. Alternatively, this framing may suggest students have not fully internalized the values or expectancies they are espousing. This latter interpretation might be supported by the fact that conditional codes are more common for self-efficacy than values: Believing something is important may be easier than believing you are capable of doing it effectively, in any domain. Future interview studies could inquire directly when students frame values or expectancies in this way to determine what this phrasing means from their perspectives.</p> <p>Ultimately, as hypothesized, students' enhancements in environmental value and self-efficacy did translate to more pro-environmental goals set after Unit 2. Four of the five new goals set by students after Unit 2 related to taking action in a professional or personal capacity. Prior work has shown that student goal-setting enhances behavioral persistence (Deci and Ryan [<reflink idref="bib18" id="ref90">18</reflink>]), supporting the idea that students might engage in action as a result of the goals they set here, though the link is far from guaranteed.</p> <p>Although the enhancements in environmental value, self-efficacy, and goals observed in this study suggest that students participating in the unit may be better equipped to side-step ecoparalysis and engage in environmentally-meaningful action, motivation may not always lead to action. Motivation varies over time (Dörnyei [<reflink idref="bib19" id="ref91">19</reflink>]), and many factors (cultural, socioeconomic, and contextual details, power dynamics, and the spatial and temporal scale of initiatives) can keep a motivated individual from engagement in environmental participation (Reed et al. [<reflink idref="bib43" id="ref92">43</reflink>]). In both semesters of the study, the community partners encouraged students to stay engaged with their organization after the course. Only two students reached out to the organization, and neither one followed through. In a subsequent iteration of the course not included in the study, we guided students through the process of writing public comments on the PFAS issue and invited them to come with us to read those statements to the local city council; two students did so. As noted in the limitations section above and the future work section below, longer-term studies that follow up with students in subsequent semesters and into their adult lives might shed additional light on whether, and under what circumstances, students are able to side-step ecoparalysis and take environmental action motivated (at least in part) by their course experience.</p> <hd id="AN0183196933-24">Contextual factors allowing community-engaged instruction</hd> <p>As the instructor and community partner, we experienced certain contextual factors as crucial to the success of the community-engaged unit. These echo commentary by other authors (e.g. Jacoby [<reflink idref="bib28" id="ref93">28</reflink>]), but we emphasize them here for other instructors. First, the class was capped at 30 students, allowing the instructor and community partner to provide constant guidance and feedback to six student teams and providing opportunities for personal connections between the instructor, students, and community partners. This level of attention and support was crucial for introductory-level undergraduates to achieve valuable outcomes for both them and the community and may have been central to students' motivational outcomes. Such small class sizes are not the norm in introductory environmental science courses at many U.S. universities, and while upper-level environmental courses are often smaller, they rarely enroll introductory-level non-science majors we believe benefit strongly from this pedagogy.</p> <p>Similarly, designing and implementing an effective community-engaged course requires a strong long-term relationship and open communication between the community partner and the instructor (Jacoby [<reflink idref="bib28" id="ref94">28</reflink>]). This extends the course planning process, the number of design iterations an instructor might go through prior to being ready to teach that course, and the amount of work and energy required to facilitate it during the semester, compared to many other instructional models. In our case, the relationship between the instructor/first author and community partner/second author unfolded over several years. Based on our experience, we encourage instructors seeking to replicate this community-engaged instructional model to begin by seeking out a relationship with potential community partners, with the aim of co-designing an instructional model that benefits both the students and the partner organization. In-depth guidance for faculty seeking to develop community-engaged courses in available in publications such as Jacoby ([<reflink idref="bib28" id="ref95">28</reflink>]).</p> <p>Due to the additional workload of designing and teaching community-engaged courses, institutions that value them should consider additional forms of support and compensation to faculty (over and above the inherent value of purposeful courses and more engaged students). We encourage administrators to think creatively about ways to limit class sizes and provide additional resources, time, and structures that support and incentivize environmental science instructors to connect and develop long-term relationships with local community partners and teach these time- and resource-intensive courses.</p> <hd id="AN0183196933-25">Future work</hd> <p>Based on our findings, we recommend that environmental education research continue to explore alternative models for community-engaged courses and their relative benefits for motivating engagement with environmental issues. For example, might students be more likely to engage in environmental action after a full semester-long community engaged course, rather than just one unit? Can we achieve better self-efficacy outcomes by asking students to research additional coupled environmental-social issues in their communities and propose their own plan to address them? Furthermore, different models may be more effective at achieving other desired student outcomes, such as critical thinking, communication, or even impacting students' post-graduation employment outcomes.</p> <p>Future research with more diverse student populations should also consider the relative impact of community-engaged course designs for students from racially minoritized or low-income communities relative to their white, high-socioeconomic status peers. Prior literature suggests helping people and giving back to their communities though their work may be especially important priorities for students of color (Carter et al. [<reflink idref="bib13" id="ref96">13</reflink>]; McGee et al. [<reflink idref="bib33" id="ref97">33</reflink>]; Thoman et al. [<reflink idref="bib51" id="ref98">51</reflink>]). In the unstudied subsequent iteration of the course, both students who came with us to read their public comments to the city council were young women of color who expressed that the opportunity was among the most meaningful of their educational careers so far. While our study did not enroll sufficient students of color to statistically compare their outcomes to those of their white peers, future interview studies might be able to test the hypothesis that these experiences may be more impactful for those from minoritized groups.</p> <p>Finally, future studies should follow participating students longitudinally beyond graduation, tracking their long-term engagement with pro-environmental behaviors as citizens and professionals, and tracking their likelihood of experiencing ecoparalysis or other negative eco-emotional states over time. Such studies are necessary to determine whether, for whom, and under what conditions the short-term observed motivational enhancements resulting from the community-engaged unit translate into the desired overarching outcomes.</p> <hd id="AN0183196933-26">Conclusions</hd> <p>Community engaged courses may be uniquely impactful in helping students in introductory courses overcome their internalized sense of ecoparalysis, develop a sense of self-efficacy to tackle coupled environmental-social challenges, and foster new related values and professional and personal goals. As such, administrators are encouraged to consider ways to support this relatively time- and labor-intensive instructional model, such as by helping to connect faculty with potential community partners and providing additional time for the course development process. In terms of research, future work should investigate their relative impact on a greater number of students, particularly students from minoritized groups, and compare the details of community-engaged course models to determine their relative effectiveness for achieving different outcomes.</p> <hd id="AN0183196933-27">Acknowledgements</hd> <p>Support for the community-engaged course examined in this study was provided by the Kernodle Center for Civic Life at Elon University. The research and writing process was supported by the New Faculty Summer Research Fund at Elon University. This manuscript benefitted from feedback from four anonymous peer reviewers.</p> <hd id="AN0183196933-28">Disclosure statement</hd> <p>No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).</p> <ref id="AN0183196933-29"> <title> References </title> <blist> <bibl id="bib1" idref="ref20" type="bt">1</bibl> <bibtext> Aarnio-Linnanvuori, E. 2019. " How Do Teachers Perceive Environmental Responsibility? 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  Data: Addressing Ecoparalysis: A Community-Engaged Unit Enhances Undergraduate Student Environmental Value and Problem-Solving Self-Efficacy
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  Label: Language
  Group: Lang
  Data: English
– Name: Author
  Label: Authors
  Group: Au
  Data: <searchLink fieldCode="AR" term="%22Kelsey+S%2E+Bitting%22">Kelsey S. Bitting</searchLink> (ORCID <externalLink term="https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3380-3822">0000-0003-3380-3822</externalLink>)<br /><searchLink fieldCode="AR" term="%22Jessica+A%2E+Merricks%22">Jessica A. Merricks</searchLink> (ORCID <externalLink term="https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8410-8208">0000-0002-8410-8208</externalLink>)
– Name: TitleSource
  Label: Source
  Group: Src
  Data: <searchLink fieldCode="SO" term="%22Environmental+Education+Research%22"><i>Environmental Education Research</i></searchLink>. 2025 31(3):529-547.
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  Data: Routledge. Available from: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. 530 Walnut Street Suite 850, Philadelphia, PA 19106. Tel: 800-354-1420; Tel: 215-625-8900; Fax: 215-207-0050; Web site: http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals
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  Data: Y
– Name: Pages
  Label: Page Count
  Group: Src
  Data: 19
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  Label: Publication Date
  Group: Date
  Data: 2025
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  Label: Document Type
  Group: TypDoc
  Data: Journal Articles<br />Reports - Research
– Name: Audience
  Label: Education Level
  Group: Audnce
  Data: <searchLink fieldCode="EL" term="%22Higher+Education%22">Higher Education</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="EL" term="%22Postsecondary+Education%22">Postsecondary Education</searchLink>
– Name: Subject
  Label: Descriptors
  Group: Su
  Data: <searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Undergraduate+Students%22">Undergraduate Students</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Environmental+Education%22">Environmental Education</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Problem+Solving%22">Problem Solving</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Climate%22">Climate</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Self+Efficacy%22">Self Efficacy</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Instructional+Design%22">Instructional Design</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Values%22">Values</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Learning+Motivation%22">Learning Motivation</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Goal+Orientation%22">Goal Orientation</searchLink>
– Name: DOI
  Label: DOI
  Group: ID
  Data: 10.1080/13504622.2024.2374329
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  Label: ISSN
  Group: ISSN
  Data: 1350-4622<br />1469-5871
– Name: Abstract
  Label: Abstract
  Group: Ab
  Data: Undergraduates often express that they feel powerless to help solve important challenges such as climate change and environmental degradation, consistent with the broader phenomena of ecoparalysis. Viewed through value-expectancy frameworks for motivation, value for an outcome and self-efficacy to achieve it lead to goals, which motivate engagement. This study evaluates the impact of a community-engaged course unit, versus a unit without a community-engaged component, in a general-education university environmental science course in the United States on student expressions of environmental value, self-efficacy, and goals. Qualitative analysis of written reflections reveals enhancements in students' pro-environmental values, environmental problem-solving self-efficacy, and environmentally-related goals. Paired quantitative analysis comparing code frequencies in reflections (n = 37) show statistically significant enhancements in environmental value (p = .00013, Cohen's d = 0.930) and self-efficacy (p = .00082, d = 0.807). These outcomes suggest community-engaged coursework can help reduce students' ecoparalysis and motivate them to engage in pro-environmental action beyond the bounds of the course.
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  Data: 2025
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  Data: EJ1465048
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RecordInfo BibRecord:
  BibEntity:
    Identifiers:
      – Type: doi
        Value: 10.1080/13504622.2024.2374329
    Languages:
      – Text: English
    PhysicalDescription:
      Pagination:
        PageCount: 19
        StartPage: 529
    Subjects:
      – SubjectFull: Undergraduate Students
        Type: general
      – SubjectFull: Environmental Education
        Type: general
      – SubjectFull: Problem Solving
        Type: general
      – SubjectFull: Climate
        Type: general
      – SubjectFull: Self Efficacy
        Type: general
      – SubjectFull: Instructional Design
        Type: general
      – SubjectFull: Values
        Type: general
      – SubjectFull: Learning Motivation
        Type: general
      – SubjectFull: Goal Orientation
        Type: general
    Titles:
      – TitleFull: Addressing Ecoparalysis: A Community-Engaged Unit Enhances Undergraduate Student Environmental Value and Problem-Solving Self-Efficacy
        Type: main
  BibRelationships:
    HasContributorRelationships:
      – PersonEntity:
          Name:
            NameFull: Kelsey S. Bitting
      – PersonEntity:
          Name:
            NameFull: Jessica A. Merricks
    IsPartOfRelationships:
      – BibEntity:
          Dates:
            – D: 01
              M: 01
              Type: published
              Y: 2025
          Identifiers:
            – Type: issn-print
              Value: 1350-4622
            – Type: issn-electronic
              Value: 1469-5871
          Numbering:
            – Type: volume
              Value: 31
            – Type: issue
              Value: 3
          Titles:
            – TitleFull: Environmental Education Research
              Type: main
ResultId 1