Understanding Pro-environmental Behaviour of Accounting and Business Students: Development of a Conceptual Framework

In recent years, many environmental and ecological problems have been witnessed in the globe that calls for increasing attention. Educating both mature and young students together with understanding their behaviours with respect to environmental and sustainability theme and taking appropriate course of actions is perceived important as part of the answering such problems. Given that considerable investment in environmental and sustainability education have been made in educational institutions such as school, colleges and the universities level, the idea of enlightening and encouraging students to initiate and promote environmental behaviours involve many antecedents, moderating and mediating factors, which necessitate further investigation. Against the backdrop, the current study reviews education, social science and sustainability literature and identify different factors that could influence of pro-environmental behaviours for universities students. Triangulating the views based on four established psychological theories such as the Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB), Social Cognitive Theory, Schwart’s Norm Activation Theory and Values-Beliefs-Norms Theory, a theoretical framework has been outlined in the current study to guide future research efforts aimed at exploring sustainability and pro-environmental actions of tertiary students. The framework is also beneficial for the academic community for future empirical investigation.