Speaker
Description
Benson, T.
Kabale university
bturyasingura@kab.ac.ug
Track: Sustainability and the Future
Environmental sustainability challenges, including climate change, biodiversity loss, ecosystem degradation, and increasing uncertainty in environmental decision-making, require researchers who possess not only technical competence but also strong epistemological and philosophical foundations. However, there is evidence that most of the environmental science postgraduate courses in the world are still primarily positivist and technically oriented, and have not integrated a lot of philosophy of science (PoS). This gap plays a role in low critical reflexivity, unfocused interdisciplinary integration and poor translation of research into effective environmental policy and practice in Uganda and many other countries in Sub-Saharan Africa. The purpose of this study was to analyze the inclusion of the philosophy of science in postgraduate studies in environmental science and to create a framework for enhancing the transformative learning and sustainable environmental research. In particular, the study examined the degree of PoS integration, its role in critical thinking, reflexivity and transformative learning, pedagogical approaches that work in the integration of PoS and a framework for the integration of PoS. A systematic review based on the PRISMA 2020 guidelines was carried out on the literature published from 1992 to 2025 from Scopus, Web of Science, ERIC, Google Scholar, and environmental science databases. The results showed that 15% of the programmes had complete integration of PoS and 45% had partial integration. In terms of interdisciplinary integration, students exposed to PoS showed a higher score, as well as a score higher than baseline for mixed-methods justification and bias recognition. Changes in anthropocentric and ecocentric/bionecentric worldviews occurred in 60% and 15%, respectively, of the respondents, respectively. Case-based learning, reflexive research practice, interdisciplinary seminars, problem-based inquiry, and philosophical journaling were used in the pedagogical approaches. This study findings conclude that when the philosophy of science is incorporated, it has a significant impact on transformative learning, methodological rigor and evidence-based environmental decision making. It suggests curriculum changes, faculty development, institutional policy support and incorporation of philosophical reflection in the postgraduate environmental programmes. The study has added a context-specific framework for embedding the philosophy of science in the post graduate training of environmental scientists in Uganda and other similar contexts in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Keywords: Environmental science education, sustainable research, critical thinking, and evidence-based decision-making.