The theory of social representations has a fundamental role in the pursuit of the comprehension on the social thinking about the environment and the natural resources, for it allows to understand how humans relate with such resources. This study aimed to identify the size of informational social representations on water and environment, as well as the relationship between them, for 150 participants who answered open questions on what they knew about the two issues. The textual material of the responses was submitted to a descending hierarchical classification, using the software ALCESTE. This procedure allowed us to identify that the social representation of environment consists of four classes that highlight the environmental problems, the educational needs for care, the importance it has for life, and its characteristics. The water representation, also composed of four classes, considered water important for life, deals with the water situation on the planet, the necessary care, and also the uses of water. Some relations could be verified between the two representations. The content identified in the classes was not limited to the informational dimension of the representation, but extrapolated it, so both representations were studied in their global aspects.
Social representations; Environment; Water; Behavioral ecology; Environmental psychology
