Determining the environmental ethics cognitive structures and alternative concepts of teacher candidates

This study was carried out to determine the cognitive perceptions, conceptual structures, metaphorical perceptions and misconceptions of undergraduate students about environmental ethics and also to indicate the importance of environmental ethics. The sample of the study consists of 209 undergraduate students studying at the Faculty of Education of Necmettin Erbakan University in Konya. In this study, WAT (Word Association Test), metaphor technique and open-ended questions were used as data collection tools. Content analysis was used in the analysis of the data obtained in the word association test. Students were asked to write the words that came to their minds about the key concept of "environmental ethics" in 10 empty boxes within 60 seconds. After the key concepts were written, they were asked to form sentences. When the data were analyzed, the answer words written by the students were grouped under 8 categories. These categories are; environmental problems, environment and environmental protection awareness, legal regulations, environmental ethics and morality, environmental cleaning and education, social ethics, ecology and natural environment, and other unrelated words. The category with the highest frequency is ecology and natural environment. In the word association test, when the concepts written by the students were examined, it was seen that the terms such as waste, keeping the environment clean, nature, respect for the environment, and environmental pollution were emphasized. The sentences formed by the students are divided into sentences containing scientific information, sentences containing non-scientific or superficial information, sentences containing misconceptions and sentences that are irrelevant. Content analysis was used in the analysis of the data obtained with the metaphor technique. The students were asked to write what they likened to environmental ethics and to write the reason in the explanation part. When the data were examined, the words and frequency values that students compared environmental ethics were gathered under 12 categories. These categories are; environmental ethics as a reflection of nature, environmental ethics as a necessity, environmental ethics as a preservative, environmental ethics as a functioning and continuity, environmental ethics as an inclusive environment, environmental ethics as a social value, environmental ethics as ecology, environmental ethics as a philosophical, environmental ethics as an analyst environmental ethics, environmental ethics as morality and environmental ethics as future. Categories with high frequency; environmental ethics as a functioning and continuity and environmental ethics as a protector. The most repetitive metaphors are water, tree and cleaning metaphors. Content analysis method was used to evaluate the data obtained from open-ended questions. In the open-ended questions, "What do you understand when you say environmental ethics? Do you think you act in accordance with environmental ethics? What do you think are the behaviors that comply with environmental ethics? What do you think are the effects of environmental ethics on protecting living things?" were asked. The answers to these questions were evaluated. As a result, when the word association test, metaphor technique and open-ended questions were evaluated, it was seen that the cognitive structures of the students related to the environmental and ethical concepts were sufficient at a certain level within the context of the data obtained. However, some of the students cannot evaluate the concept of environment and ethics as a whole. The fact that students evaluate the concepts of environment and ethics separately in the questions in the study shows this. Teachers are at all levels in the education of students. For this reason, it is very important for the environment to conduct education and research on environmental ethics everywhere, especially in schools.