Awareness and Knowledge of the Sustainable Development Goals in a University Community in Southwestern Nigeria

Abstract

BACKGROUND: The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) isa globally accepted developmental agenda, and it is expected thateveryone everywhere in the world would be aware,knowledgeable and be willing to contribute to its attainment.This study aims to assess the level of awareness, knowledge of,and attitudes towards the SDGs among members of a universitycommunity.METHODS: A cross-sectional survey was conducted on 450students and staff of Osun State University, SouthwesternNigeria, selected from three of its six multi-campuses via multi-stage sampling. Data were collected by means of semi-structuredquestionnaire. Data were analysed using SPSS version 20.0.RESULTS: The mean age for the respondents was 26(10.2)years. Only 43% of the respondents were aware of the SDGs andonly 4.2% had good knowledge of the SDGs. However, 56.3%had positive attitude towards it. More respondents with goodknowledge of the SDGs were either acadenic staff or those havebeen enlightened via personal study of the SDGs or throughother means. Similarly having a positive attitude was associatedwith being an academic staff/ high level of education as well asbelonging to the middle age group. (p<0.05).CONCLUSION: The awareness of and attitudes towards theSDGs was just fair. However, the level of knowledge wasabysmally low, and this has serious negative implications forSDGs attainment. Pertinent individual and population-levelmethods of enlightening people about the SDGs must be put inplace in educational settings; curricular changes are imperative.