Global citizenship identity mediates the relationship of knowledge, cognitive, and socio-emotional skills with engagement towards global issues

Participants

We collected data from a varied international cohort of adult participants to ensure variability in the dataset and achieve a thorough understanding of how the variables interact within real-world contexts. An a priori power analysis was conducted to estimate the sample size needed for the study using G*Power (details presented in Supplementary Material Sect. S1). A sample of 249 participants from 16 countries completed the study. 50.2{3898e331af1204232834ee4b271ab810d758071928e09067d8268169721bee90} of the respondents indicated their country of residence as the US, 39.4{3898e331af1204232834ee4b271ab810d758071928e09067d8268169721bee90} as India, and 10.4{3898e331af1204232834ee4b271ab810d758071928e09067d8268169721bee90} as others (full list of ‘other’ countries can be found in Table 1). Participants reported a mean age of 35.04 years (SD = 9.06, range: 21–65 years); 57.0{3898e331af1204232834ee4b271ab810d758071928e09067d8268169721bee90} of them identified themselves as male, 42.6{3898e331af1204232834ee4b271ab810d758071928e09067d8268169721bee90} as female, and 0.4{3898e331af1204232834ee4b271ab810d758071928e09067d8268169721bee90} chose not to disclose their gender. Other demographic details, such as their education level and perceived socio-economic status, are summarized in Table 1.

Procedure

Participants for the study were recruited via Amazon’s Mechanical Turk in January and February 2023, where they completed an online survey built on Qualtrics in exchange for monetary compensation (US$1). To minimize forged responses, the survey included various validation items (i.e., robot check, control questions, and open-answer screening; see full survey design in Supplementary Material Sect. S2).

The research adhered to the Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct outlined by the American Psychological Association³⁸, as well as the Declaration of Helsinki. Approval for the research study was obtained from the governing board of UNESCO Mahatma Gandhi Institute of Education for Peace and Sustainable Development, which comprises senior researchers and policymakers. The study did not involve vulnerable populations, and no risks to the participants’ well-being were identified. All participants were 18 years of age or older and proficient in English. Voluntary participation was ensured, and informed consent was obtained before commencement. Upon completion, participants were briefed on the specific academic objectives of the study. Responses were collected with strict anonymity and confidentiality.

First, the following self-reported model measures were administered in a randomized order: awareness of global issues, critical inquiry, and cognitive empathy. Next, participants were administered questionnaires on engagement towards global issues, followed by global citizenship identification. Since research suggests that social desirability can undermine the accuracy of the self-report measures³⁹, we measured social desirability as a control variable. Socio-demographic information was collected at the end to avoid stereotype threat. Additional measures were administered but not used in the present study. The full protocol is available in Supplementary Material Sect. S2.

Instruments

The following scales were used in the study and items within them were presented in a randomized order:

Awareness of global issues was measured using 7 items from OECD-PISA’s Global Competence Assessment protocol⁶, where participants reported the extent to which they are aware of seven global issues (i.e., they heard about the topic and can explain it), namely climate change and global warming; global health; international conflicts; hunger or malnutrition in different parts of the world; causes of poverty; and equality between genders in different parts of the world. Answers were given using a 4-point Likert-type scale (1 = I have never heard of this to 4 = I am familiar with this and I would be able to explain this well) and were used to construct an index of awareness of global issues (higher mean ratings indicate greater awareness about global issues; α = 0.73).

Critical inquiry was measured by 7 items forming the critical openness subscale of the Critical Thinking Disposition Scale (CTDS;⁴⁰). It is used to assess participants’ tendency to be actively open to new ideas, critical in evaluating these ideas and modifying one’s thinking in light of convincing evidence (e.g., “I usually try to think about the bigger picture during a discussion”; “I sometimes find a good argument that challenges some of my firmly held beliefs”), using a 5-point Likert-type scale (1 = I strongly disagree to 5 = I strongly agree; higher mean ratings reflect greater critical inquiry; α = 0.73).

Cognitive empathy was measured by 4 items forming the cognitive empathy subscale of the Interpersonal and Social Empathy Index (ISEI;¹⁴). It was used to assess participants’ ability to cognitively process and perceive other’s points of view and emotions (e.g., “I can consider my point of view and another person’s point of view at the same time”), and to recognise the difference between other’s experiences from one’s own (e.g., “I can tell the difference between someone else’s feelings and my own”), using a 5-point Likert-type scale (1 = Never to 5 = Very frequently/always; higher mean ratings indicate greater cognitive empathy; α = 0.69).

Engagement towards global issues was measured by asking participants to report how frequently they engage in activities in their daily lives towards global challenges in general, using 4 items from OECD-PISA’s Global Competence Assessment protocol (⁶; e.g., “I reduce the energy I use at home to protect the environment (for example, by turning off the heating, the air conditioning or the lights when leaving a room)”; “I regularly read websites on international social issues (for example, conflicts, human rights)“), using a 5-point Likert-type scale (1 = Never to 5 = Very frequently/always; higher mean ratings reflect greater engagement regarding global issues; α = 0.68).

Global citizenship identification was assessed by the Four Item measure of Social Identification (FISI,⁴¹). One item measured social identification with the group of global citizens (i.e., “I identify with global citizens”) and three items measured aspects of the self-investment dimension of social identification, namely solidarity with other group members (i.e., “I feel committed to global citizens”), satisfaction with the membership (i.e., “I am glad to be a global citizen”) and centrality of group membership (i.e., “Being a global citizen is an important part of how I see myself”), using a 5-point Likert-type scale (1 = I strongly disagree to 5 = I strongly agree; higher mean ratings reflect greater identification as a global citizen; α = 0.84).

Social desirability was measured by 8 items forming the impression management subscale of the Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding Short Form (BIDR-16;⁴², which reflect a tendency to give positively inflated self-descriptions to an audience (e.g., “I don’t gossip about other people’s business”) rated on 5-point Likert-type scale (1 = I strongly disagree to 5 = I strongly agree; higher mean ratings reflect a greater tendency to socially desirable responding; α = 0.64).

Statistical analyses

All statistical analyses were performed on R version 4.0.2. After cleaning the dataset, descriptive analyses were performed for the study’s main variables. Besides calculating the summary statistics, two-tailed, bivariate Pearson correlations were calculated. The strength of the correlations was determined using Hopkin’s recommendations⁴³: trivial (< 0.1), small (0.1–0.3), moderate (0.3–0.5), high (0.5–0.7), very high (0.7– 0.9) or practically perfect (> 0.9).

To test the hypotheses, mediation analysis was conducted with the help of the mediation package in R. Prior to the analysis, critical assumptions related to regression modeling were tested. Specifically, to test hypotheses H1, H2, and H3, three individual models were built using the three exogenous variables: awareness of global issues, critical inquiry and cognitive empathy, respectively. In the models, global citizenship identification was entered as the mediator, engagement towards global issues as the endogenous variable, and social desirability as the control variable. This causal direction was decided based on theoretical considerations. Theories in developmental psychology and education suggest that individual traits, such as knowledge and skills, are foundational in shaping one’s identity. As individuals gain knowledge and develop skills, they become more aware of their global interconnectedness and responsibilities, which can foster a global citizenship identity⁸. Similarly, research from social identity theories suggest that identity formation is influenced by ongoing interactions with the environment and acquired knowledge. For instance, research indicates that knowledge contribution in communities can lead to the development of social and self-identity through social interaction ties and membership esteem⁴⁴. Environmental identity development is facilitated by interactions, action, and recognition, with diverse interactions playing a crucial role in this social development⁴⁵. Thus, it is plausible that global citizenship identity evolves as a result of increased knowledge and skills.

Since the Sobel test poses several problems such as low statistical power⁴⁶ and assumption of normality of the product of a and b coefficients⁴⁷, the present study used the bias-corrected and accelerated (BCa) bootstrapping technique⁴⁷, which helped assess both the magnitude and significance of the indirect (mediation) effects. 5,000 resamples of the data were used for bootstrapping and all reported results used an \(\alpha\) value of p = 0.05. 95{3898e331af1204232834ee4b271ab810d758071928e09067d8268169721bee90} confidence intervals were calculated, and they were considered significant if they did not include a zero.