Mapping ESD-Related Beliefs Among Pre-Service Primary School Teachers: A Q-Methodological Approach

Teachers’ beliefs about Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) shape how they perceive and enact ESD as an educational task, yet remain empirically understudied, particularly among pre-service primary school teachers. This study investigates ESD-related belief patterns among pre-service primary school teachers specialising in Natural and Social Sciences in Germany, addressing both the structural configuration of shared beliefs and how these configurations reflect a fundamental tension between ESD as a political programme and ESD as an independent educational concept. Using Q-methodology, 31 pre-service teachers from nine German universities sorted 31 statements about ESD. Factor analysis identified three structurally distinct, yet partially overlapping, viewpoints: ESD as a Whole-School Task of Fostering Autonomy, ESD as a Critical-Transformative Educational Concept, and ESD as an Individual Teaching Responsibility. The viewpoints share a general-pedagogical belief core centred on autonomy, real-world relevance, and cross-curricular responsibility, while explicitly political-critical dimensions of ESD are absent from this shared core. Across the viewpoints, the political and normative orientation of ESD is related in different ways to educational claims of autonomy, independent judgement, and non-indoctrination. The findings have implications for pre-service teacher education and contribute to closing a methodological gap in ESD belief research by revealing how individual ESD-related beliefs are configured and related within distinct viewpoints.