P. Yanti, V. Gaffar, P. Harisandi, I. Ramadhani, T. Yuliawati, S. Yusriani
Studies on environmentally friendly practices in education have grown significantly due to global sustainability issues, but thorough reviews that combine bibliometric mapping with conceptual analysis are still limited. The study objectives were to analyze global scholarly output on green behavior and education for sustainable development. It also assessed how this field connects to sustainability governance and environmental management strategies. The study analyzes worldwide academic contributions to education for sustainable development and environmentally friendly practices by integrating bibliometric analysis with a narrative synthesis of significant studies. A total of 330 peer-reviewed articles published between 2008 and 2025 in the Web of Science database were analyzed using the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses 2020 guidelines. Biblioshiny and CiteSpace software were employed to examine publication trends, collaboration networks, citation patterns, and thematic clusters, while highly cited and representative studies were synthesized to clarify methodological approaches, theoretical insights, and policy relevance. The results show an annual growth rate of 25.26 percent since 2016 across 111 journals, with a significant contribution from advanced economies, while participation from developing regions is gradually on the rise. There has been a rise in international collaboration, which now constitutes 31.5 percent of publications, yet there are still imbalances in research capacity. Three core dimensions consistently emerge: organizational drivers such as green human resource management, organizational citizenship behavior for the environment, and transformational leadership; individual factors including attitudes, social norms, and behavioral intentions; and systemic conditions encompassing consumer education, green marketing, and sustainable consumption. Narrative evidence illustrates the significance of leadership, behavioral interventions, and supportive policy frameworks in fostering sustainability outcomes. The review illustrates that education focused on sustainable development promotes green behavior, which plays a crucial role in advancing environmental management and governance. Additionally, emphasizes the significance of theoretical frameworks including the theory of planned behavior, the value–belief–norm model, and the technology acceptance model. Nonetheless, integrative approaches remain limited, and gaps persist in contributions from developing regions, adoption of digital innovation, and comparative cross-country studies. The study indicates that integrating sustainability principles into education is a long-term investment in human capital and serves as a catalyst for collective environmental change, providing evidence-based recommendations for future studies, institutional practices, and policy formulation. © 2025 The author(s). This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third-party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this license, visit: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Faculty of Economics and Business Education, Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia, Jl. Dr. Setiabudi No.229, West Java, Bandung, Indonesia; Graduate School of Business, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Pulau Pinang, Malaysia
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