Self-regulation of learning and pro-environmental behaviors of future teachers: mapping and intervention on self-regulatory processes

Abstract

Self-regulation of learning is the process by which students manage their thoughts, feelings, and behaviors to achieve a certain goal. It involves the activation of cognitive, metacognitive, affective and motivational processes. Self-regulated learning is essential in teacher education, as it makes licentiate students better students and helps them to foster it in their future students. The objectives of this research are: a) to identify cognitive, metacognitive, motivational and affective variables associated with the self-regulation of learning of undergraduate students at a Brazilian public university; b) to explore relationships among the aforementioned variables and participants' demographic and academic life characteristics; and c) to construct a theoretical-reflective intervention program to promote self-regulated learning and evaluate its effectiveness for participants in terms of strengthening the self-regulation of their learning, increasing their conceptual knowledge about the key variables related to self-regulated learning and the possibility to apply the knowledge acquired in themselves as university students and in their future teaching practice. Moreover, this research also intends to bring together different areas of knowledge, by exploring relationships between participants' self-regulation of learning and their engagement in pro-environmental behaviors, considering the similarity of psychological variables involved in these two processes and the relevance of contributing to the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals proposed in the United Nations 2030 Agenda. Data will be collected using questionnaires, scales and self-reflective activities and examined using content analysis and descriptive and inferential statistics.