When considering a topic as broad as research in environmental education it seems worthwhile, at the onset, to make some basic distinctions: (1) establishing research priorities is not simply an empirical question; and (2) a much more challenging task is to more clearly understand the nature of the questions to which we seek answers. How do we go about furthering our understanding of concepts central to our field of study? In exploring this question, conceptual analysis is an important research area that it is not simply an option, but rather a logical necessity if there is to be established greater coherence within environmental education. Environmental educators must understand that their field is full of inherently difficult concepts that exist as abstractions in the minds of men and women. What this means is that concepts central to environmental education are "not" amenable to standardisation or precise definition and they "are" subject to careless application and misuse. Communication depends upon the presence of shared meaning, and conceptual analysis is concerned with seeking and understanding the basis for such meaning.