Bridging the Gap: How High School Belonging and Innovative Behavior Retrospective Links Long-Term Pro-Environmental Behavior Through an Extended Theory of Planned Behavior Model

Environmental education is crucial for promoting sustainable behavior, yet maintaining engagement across educational transitions remains challenging. Drawing on the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB), this study examined how high school experiences influence pro-environmental behavior (PEB) during the transition to university. We integrated sense of school belonging (SB) and pro-environmental innovative behavior (IB) as school-based antecedents to the TPB framework. A retrospective survey was conducted with 1879 first-year university students, and structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to test the hypothesized relationships. Results provided robust support for the integrated model. Consistent with TPB, attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control significantly predicted pro-environmental intention, which subsequently predicted actual PEB. Both IB and SB emerged as significant predictors of these cognitive factors, with SB also promoting engagement in innovative activities. The model explained 72.4% of the variance in intention and 37.5% in actual behavior. Multigroup analysis revealed that while the structural model was stable across gender, certain pathway strengths varied. These findings offer empirical evidence for the retrospective associations of pro-environmental behavior, demonstrating that the recalled social–emotional and experiential contexts of high school are consistently related to university students’ current environmental actions. This study extends the TPB by highlighting the developmental role of school environments in fostering long-term environmental responsibility.