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Personal approach to sustainability of future decision makers: a Hungarian case

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Abstract

Several studies deal with the description and categorization of perception of corporate social responsibility. Focusing on university students contributes to the development of proper education and business strategies for increasing social responsibility. Besides exploring the differences in personal attitudes by socio-demographic characteristics, it is essential to understand the common influential factors behind the perceptions and attitudes related to the field. This paper explores the perceptions of Hungarian university students related to sustainability and CSR and aims at detecting the most important factors which influence these perceptions based on a data set of 397 higher education students from three Hungarian universities. The differences in students’ perceptions between subsamples by gender, university and CSR-related knowledge were detected by nonlinear canonical correlation analysis. Key findings suggest that females have a more sensitive approach to environmental and social problems, and a greater trust in CSR than males as opposed to male students with a more techno-optimistic view. Impacts of CSR-related studies and institutional background of universities on students’ perceptions are also highlighted. Common latent influential factors affecting students’ perceptions were explored and illustrated graphically by multidimensional scaling methodology. The two-dimensional solutions of the method show that students’ perceptions associated with sustainability, CSR, environmental impacts of industries and the presence of global problems are influenced by two latent but identifiable dimensions separately; however, the weights of dimensions differ by gender, academic background and former CSR studies of the individuals of students. We can conclude that understanding these common factors and their importance could contribute to an appropriate and comprehensive development of CSR education.

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Fig. 1

Source Own model based on OVERALS procedures executed by SPSS 22.0

Fig. 2

Source Own model, based on OVERALS analysis conducted by SPSS 22.0

Fig. 3

Source Own model, based on OVERALS analysis conducted by SPSS 22.0

Fig. 4

Source Own model, based on OVERALS analysis conducted by SPSS 22.0

Fig. 5

Source Own model, based on OVERALS analysis conducted by SPSS 22.0

Fig. 6

Source Own model, based on OVERALS analysis conducted by SPSS 22.0

Fig. 7

Source Own model, based on MDS analysis conducted by SPSS 22.0

Fig. 8

Source Own model, based on MDS analysis conducted by SPSS 22.0

Fig. 9

Source Own model, based on MDS analysis conducted by SPSS 22.0

Fig. 10

Source Own model, based on MDS analysis conducted by SPSS 22.0

Fig. 11

Source Own model, based on MDS analysis conducted by SPSS 22.0

Fig. 12

Source Own model, based on SPSS 22.0 dimension weight scatterplots

Fig. 13

Source Own model, based on SPSS 22.0 dimension weight scatterplots

Fig. 14

Source Own model, based on SPSS 22.0 WMDS solutions’ dimension weight scatterplots

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  1. Department of Strategy and Project Management, Corvinus University of Budapest, Fővám tér 8, 1093, Budapest, Hungary

    Nikolett Deutsch

  2. Institute of Management Science, University of Miskolc, Egyetemváros, 3515, Miskolc, Hungary

    László Berényi

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  1. Nikolett Deutsch
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Deutsch, N., Berényi, L. Personal approach to sustainability of future decision makers: a Hungarian case. Environ Dev Sustain 20, 271–303 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10668-016-9881-9

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