ATTITUDES AND PERCEPTIONS OF SPECIAL EDUCATION TEACHERS TOWARDS ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION IN GREECE AND THE INFLUENCE OF GENDER

Abstract

Environmental education offers various benefits to students, as it improves their environmental knowledge, attitudes, intentions and behavior. Within the context of special education students, environmental education can generate great opportunities for sensory experiences in nature and hands-on learning, resulting in a deeper connection between students with disabilities and the environment. Teachers play a significant role in helping students shape environmental awareness and participate in effective teaching and inclusive learning processes. Despite the importance of the above considerations, there are few studies examining teachers’ environmental attitudes and behaviors, in the case of special education in Greece. What is more, the role of gender shaping special education teachers’ environmental attitudes and behaviors is a theme that lacks investigation in literature. Under this problematic, the current study set as a goal to present the attitudes and perceptions of special education teachers towards environmental education in Greece and examined the influence of gender on their attitudes and perceptions. For the above purpose, two research questions were oriented. The first research question examined what the level of environmental attitudes and responsible behaviors of special education teachers in Greece is and the second one investigated if these attitudes and behaviors differ between the men and women. The examination of the current research work was based on quantitative method. The research process took place during February 2026 at four public school units in Athens and Thessaloniki. The research sample consisted of 50 special education teachers (90% women, 10% men). The research instrument was a closed type of questionnaire that involved two main tools, notably the Revised New Ecological Paradigm (NEP) Scale and the Teacher Environmental Literacy Assessment (TELA), of which only the section "Behavior" was used. A section of demographics was also included in the questionnaire. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze the quantitative survey data. Analysis was conducted on SPSS statistical program v.21. According to the results, special education teachers presented a relatively high level of environmental behavior overall. The results indicate that special education teachers exhibit developed environmental awareness and frequent adoption of sustainable practices, which is particularly important given their role in shaping students' environmental awareness. With reference to gender and environmental attitudes and behaviors, small differences were observed in the current study between men and women. The current research showed that gender differences are not significant. Overall, both genders show a similar level of ecological behavior. Future research should examine environmental attitudes and behaviors of special education teachers in a larger sample, while also other variables could also be investigated as about their role in shaping these environmental attitudes and behaviors, like teachers’ educational and cultural backgrounds. Finally, it is important for teachers to integrate environmental education into their practices, to generate various beneficial outcomes for their students and help them learn in an inclusive learning environment that environmental education can guarantee. Training of teachers and skills’ development is fundamental for this purpose.