Climate Change Education and Ethical Reasoning: Exploring Students’ Responses to Socio-Scientific Issues
Keywords:
climate change education, ethical reasoning, socio-scientific issues, scientific literacy, student responsesAbstract
Climate change is a complex scientific and social issue that requires students to understand scientific evidence while considering ethical and societal consequences. Socio-scientific issues (SSI) can provide meaningful contexts for developing students’ scientific understanding, ethical reasoning, and ability to respond to controversial environmental problems. This article aims to examine students’ responses to climate change as a socio-scientific issue, with particular attention to ethical reasoning, scientific understanding, and decision-making. A literature review was used to synthesize recent studies on climate change education and SSI-based science learning. The findings indicate that SSI learning can encourage students to consider multiple perspectives, evaluate evidence, discuss competing values, and develop more informed responses to climate-related problems. Therefore, integrating climate change with socio-scientific learning can support both scientific literacy and responsible decision-making
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