Effect of a Climate Change Educational Program on University Students’ Knowledge, Attitudes, and Practices

Background: Climate change impacts human lives and health by threatening the essential ingredients of good health such as clean ‎air, safe drinking water, nutritious food supply, and safe shelter. It ‎has the potential to undermine decades of progress in global health. ‎Aim of the study: to evaluate the effect of the Climate Change Educational Program on University Students’ Knowledge, Attitudes, and Practices. Subjects and Methods: This quasi-experimental study was conducted in Mansoura and Fayoum Universities on 200 university students. A self-administered questionnaire was used for data collection, with three scales to assess their knowledge, attitude, and reported practice. Results: Students were mostly females (65.5%), with a rural residence (67.0%). Their pre-intervention knowledge was deficient, and their attitudes and reported practices were variable. Statistically significant improvements were revealed in their post-intervention knowledge, attitudes, and practices (p<0.001), with slight declines in their follow-up knowledge and attitudes, but a rise in their practices. Their knowledge, attitudes, and practice scores are positively correlated. In multivariate analyses, the educational program was the main positive predictor of the knowledge scores, the knowledge scores were the positive predictors of the attitude scores, and the attitude and knowledge scores were positive predictors of the practice scores. Conclusion and Recommendations: The educational awareness-raising program is effective in improving university ‎students' knowledge, attitude, and reported practices regarding ‎climate change. Considerable work is required to integrate climate ‎change concepts into the university curricula. The developed program and booklet could serve as a basis for further educational interventions.