Environmental Behaviour Among University Students: The Application of Theory of Planned Behaviour Model

• Main Author: Abdullah, Osman
• Format: Thesis
• Language: English; English
• Published: 2012
• Subjects: GE Environmental Sciences; LB2300 Higher Education
• Online Access: https://etd.uum.edu.my/3820/7/91003.pdf; https://etd.uum.edu.my/3820/13/91003.pdf; https://etd.uum.edu.my/3820/

This study was conducted to examine the environmental behaviour specifically recycling behaviour of undergraduate business students in three Public Institutions of Higher Learning, namely; Universiti Malaya, Universiti Putra Malaysia and Universiti Utara Malaysia. Specifically, this study applies the Theory of Planned Behaviour, an approach to understand the relationship of attitude towards recycling, subjective norm, perceived behaviour control, behavioural intention and recycling behaviour. A total of 500 sets of questionnaire had been distributed but only 370 questionnaires (74 percent) could be used for coding, analyzing and hypotheses testing. Data for all the study variables were collected through self-administered survey questionnaires and analyse using SPSS version 20.0. A total of five hypotheses were formulated and the results showed that only four hypotheses are supported. The results indicated that: (1) attitude towards recycling is significantly (β = .355) related to behavioural intention. (2)Subjective norm is significantly (β = .216) related to behavioural intention. (3) Perceived behavior control is not related (β = .061) to behavioural intention. (4) Behavioural intention is significantly (β = .569) related to recycling behaviour. (5) Behavioural intention partially mediates the relationship between attitude towards recycling, and subjective norm with recycling behaviour. Perceived behaviour control was dropped in hierarchical analysis due to insignificant finding in step 1 of regression analysis. This study also found that the recycling behaviour of undergraduate business students from Universiti Putra Malaysia is better than Universiti Malaya and Universiti Utara Malaysia. Theoretical, practical and policy implications of the study as well as suggestions for future studies were discussed