Future? Ask the Youth! (Environmental Consciousness in Germany - Youth Survey 2019)

In the youth study "Future? Ask the Youth!", sustainability-related views, attitudes and behaviours of young people between the ages of 14 and 22 were investigated. Specifically, it examined what young people think about the environment and climate, what concerns they have, how they get involved and what measures are important to them for environmental and climate protection. The study was conducted for the second time in 2019, following 2017. The youth study followed a participatory design with close involvement of a youth project advisory board.<br>Wave 1:
Topics: 1. Topic interests and general self-efficacy: interest in various topics; top 5 topic interests; general self-efficacy (in difficult situations I can rely on my abilities, I can cope well with most problems on my own, I can also usually solve strenuous and complicated tasks well).

2. Attitudes towards politics and society and political self-efficacy: importance of various social problems (e.g. social justice, economic development, crime, public safety, etc.); socio-political attitudes (it is very important to me to live in a democracy, I think it is good that the European Union exists, I think it is important to take part in elections, I am not really interested in politics, we need more economic growth in the future, even if it burdens the environment, it worries me when I think about the environmental conditions in which future generations will probably have to live); political self-efficacy (Political Efficacy Short Scale).

3. Environmental and climate policy: most important actors in environmental and climate protection (e.g. each and every individual, environmental associations, cities, municipalities, federal government, industry, media, schools and other educational institutions, scientists, people who invest a lot of money in certain shares, funds, etc.); sufficient activities of the aforementioned actors in Germany for environmental and climate protection; importance of central topics or demands of environmental and climate policy (e.g. limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius in the long term, introducing a tax on the emission of greenhouse gases harmful to the climate, etc.); most important topics of environmental and climate policy; most important measures of environmental and climate policy (e.g. financial support of environmentally and climate-friendly products and behaviour, higher taxation of environmentally and climate-damaging products and behaviour, etc.).

Wave 2:
Topics: 1. Fridays for future: knowledge of the Fridays for future movement; assessment of Fridays for future; willingness to commit to Fridays for future: current participation; willingness to (re)participate in Fridays for future in the future; most important reasons for (future) participation in Fridays for future; most important obstacles to participation in Fridays for future.

2. Influence and engagement: forms of political and social engagement so far (e.g. supported online actions and online petitions, participated in demonstrations, worked in a nature and environmental protection group, etc.); willingness to engage in different forms of political and social engagement.

3. Sustainability, social issues, digitalisation: Split 1: Synergies and conflicts of ecology and social issues: interest in social issues; opinion on the impact of environmental and climate protection on social goals (e.g. it is unfair that poorer people cannot afford environmentally friendly products, more environmental and climate protection in housing construction leads to higher rents, etc.). ); importance of various social issues; Split 2: Synergies and conflicts of sustainability and digitalisation: interests in the topic of digitalisation; opinion on the impact of increasing digitalisation on the environment and climate (e.g. digitalisation is harmful to the environment and climate because of the high power consumption of devices and data centres, more and more natural raw materials are mined for digital devices such as smartphones or computers, etc.); importance of various topics of digitalisation.

4. Information behaviour, environmental education and environmental knowledge: Sources of information on environmental protection and nature conservation; importance and existence of various participation-oriented projects and courses on sustainability topics at one´s own educational institution; action-relevant environmental knowledge (reasons why beef is harmful to the climate, most energy-saving lighting, environmental label of the Federal Government for environmentally friendly products, reduction of the greenhouse effect through building insulation, CO2 footprint of a product, reasons for using as little detergent and cleaning agent as possible, most environmentally harmful beverage packaging, threat to the population of wild bees, largest energy consumer in the household).

Demography: sex; age (open and categories); educational attainment; level of education; current type of school (if student); current occupation (if not student); occupation; household type; sources of income (parents, own income, BAföG, scholarship, unemployment benefit or ALG II, other); migration background of the respondent or his/her parents; country of origin.

Additionally coded were: Respondent ID; number of units; youth segments (idealistic, pragmatic, distanced); federal state; place size; east/west; weighting factor.