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Research on the mechanism of improving environmental information cognition and environmental awareness in site ecological virtual laboratory
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  • Published: 15 January 2026

Research on the mechanism of improving environmental information cognition and environmental awareness in site ecological virtual laboratory

  • Wei Gao1,
  • Pu Chen1,
  • Shengjie Hu1,
  • Yijun Liu1 &
  • …
  • Lihua Xian1 

Scientific Reports , Article number:  (2026) Cite this article

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We are providing an unedited version of this manuscript to give early access to its findings. Before final publication, the manuscript will undergo further editing. Please note there may be errors present which affect the content, and all legal disclaimers apply.

Subjects

  • Ecology
  • Environmental sciences
  • Environmental social sciences

Abstract

In the context of today’s global ecological and environmental crises and challenges, environmental education is a super important for achieving sustainable development. Traditional environmental education often suffers from superficial understanding of environmental information and a lack of depth in environmental awareness. The purpose of this study is to guide students towards a deep cognition of environmental information and to enhance environmental awareness, while exploring the pathways. The study establishes a Site-scale Ecological Virtual Laboratory (SEVL) on the campus. Based on the Game-Based Learning (GBL) model, the study introduces three mediators: self-efficacy, learning motivation, and cognitive load, to construct a Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Model (PLS-SEM). The data for this study were collected from 146 Chinese students majoring in landscape architecture. According to the analysis results derived from PLS-SEM, we confirm that: (1) SEVL can effectively intervene in environmental education; (2) SEVL influences learning motivation which subsequently affects self-efficacy, ultimately leading to positive outcomes in environmental education (β = 0.040, p < 0.05, 95%CI[0.018,0.094]); (3) SEVL impacts cognitive load which then influences self-efficacy, resulting in effective outcomes in environmental education (β = 0.048, p < 0.05, 95%CI[0.012,0.088]). The study provides a reference for leveraging virtual laboratory in environmental education.

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Data availability

Data is provided within supplementary information files.

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Acknowledgements

We are grateful for the comments and criticisms of the journal’s anonymous reviewers and our colleagues.

Funding

This study was funded by the Ministry of education of Humanities and Social Science project, grant number 24YJA760026. This study was funded by Funding by Science and Technology Projects in Guangzhou, grant number 2023A04J1561.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Forestry and Landscape Architecture, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou, 510640, China

    Wei Gao, Pu Chen, Shengjie Hu, Yijun Liu & Lihua Xian

Authors
  1. Wei Gao
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  2. Pu Chen
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  3. Shengjie Hu
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  4. Yijun Liu
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  5. Lihua Xian
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Contributions

Conceptualization, W.G. and P.C.; methodology, P.C.; software, Y.J.L. and P.C. and L.H.X.; validation, W.G. and P.C.; formal analysis, W.G. and P.C.; investigation, S.J.H.; resources, L.H.X. and S.J.H.; data curation, P.C.; writing—original draft preparation, P.C.; writing—review and editing, W.G. and P.C.; visualization, P.C.; supervision, S.J.H. and L.H.X.; project administration, W.G. and L.H.X. and S.J.H.; funding acquisition, W.G. and S.J.H. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Lihua Xian.

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Competing interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

Ethics approval

Approval is obtained from the Institutional Review Board of College of Forestry and Landscape Architecture, South China Agricultural University. Participants are recruited based on the principles of voluntary and informed consent, and the rights and privacy of participants are protected. There is no conflict of interest as well as violation of moral ethics and legal prohibitions in the content of the study. The procedures used in this study adhere to the tenets of the Declaration of Helsinki and Belmont.

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Informed consent for participation was obtained from all subjects involved in the study.

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Cite this article

Gao, W., Chen, P., Hu, S. et al. Research on the mechanism of improving environmental information cognition and environmental awareness in site ecological virtual laboratory. Sci Rep (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-35279-x

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  • Received: 20 July 2025

  • Accepted: 05 January 2026

  • Published: 15 January 2026

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-35279-x

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Keywords

  • Virtual laboratory
  • Self-efficacy
  • Environmental information
  • Environmental awareness
  • Environmental education
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