Biology in Swedish Upper Secondary School : Does it Contribute to Ecocentrism?

Sammanfattning: Environmental issues are increasingly on the agenda and education is recognised as an important part in turning the negative trend. Originally formulated in 1976, the intent of environmental education was toprotect the nature from human impact and to induce in students a sense of the natural worlds’ own values.However, this has come to change during the years and the focus now lies on the values that nature possess for humans, in the shape of education for sustainable development. Though creating a concern for the environmental issues, critics point out that the anthropocentric attitude is not as strongly committed to protecting the nature as the ecocentric attitudes are, and therefore suggest that ecocentrism should be included in the curriculums. Assuming that biology in Swedish upper secondary school is the only subject where such values may be considered this study examines whether there is a significant difference between students who undergo these classes and students who do not, in terms of their attitudes. The study was divided in two parts, where firstly a content analysis was performed to confirm that biology was indeed the only subject to include ecocentric values, and secondly a comparative study was performed with students (n=82) taking biology and students not taking biology in Swedish upper secondary school. The results imply that biology is unique in including ecocentric attitudes, however, not to the extent that was expected. Furthermore, the results reveal that there is no significant difference between students taking the biology classes and students who do not, implying that the subject biology is not successful in increasing students ecocentric attitudes.