The Correlation Between Medicinal Plant Knowledge and Students’ Conservation Attitudes Using North Sumatera Medicinal Plants Ethnoscience e-Catalog

Abstract

This study aimed to analyze the correlation between medicinal plant knowledge and students’ conservation attitudes after using the North Sumatra Medicinal Plant Ethnoscience e-Catalog. The e-Catalog is accessed through Google Sites and contains information on the local and scientific names, morphology, benefits, habitat, and conservation values of medicinal plants in North Sumatra integrated with ethnoscience. This research is a quantitative correlational study. The research subjects numbered 33 science education students. Data were collected using a medicinal plant knowledge test and a conservation attitude questionnaire. Data analysis used descriptive statistics, the Shapiro–Wilk normality test, and Spearman’s rho correlation. The results showed that the students’ average medicinal plant knowledge was 70.52 and the average conservation attitude was 40.24. Spearman’s correlation test produced a correlation coefficient of ρ = 0.687 with a significance value of p = 0.000 (p < 0.01), indicating a strong and statistically significant positive relationship between medicinal plant knowledge and students’ conservation attitudes. The coefficient of determination value of 47.2% shows that medicinal plant knowledge provides a fairly large contribution to students’ conservation attitudes. The results of this study indicate that the North Sumatra Medicinal Plant Ethnoscience e-Catalog has the potential to become an effective digital learning medium in supporting the strengthening of students’ conservation attitudes through ethnoscience integration.