Social representation of environmental education and health education in college students / Representação social da educação ambiental e da educação em saúde em universitários

Abstract

The growing globalization has been promoting economic, political and cultural modifications in several sections of the human activity. Such interdependence has been favoring the discussion of themes of global interest, as the environmental and health education. The present study aimed to investigate the social representations of the environmental education and of the health education in 204 college students of the city of Rio de Janeiro, 106 men and 98 women, with an average age of 26,9 year-old. The participants filled a questionnaire with questions on personal conceptions concerning environmental education and health education. Content analysis revealed three categories concerning environmental education (utilitarian anthropocentric conception, agreed-with anthropocentric conception and ecocentric conception) and four categories concerning health education (health as absence of disease, emphasis on body's health, health as body-mind balance and ecocentric conception of health). The conclusions suggest that environment and health are still understood as independent themes, hindering more efficient actions on the part of the population and of governmental and no governmental entities.