New Presentation

Hello, my name is Emma Lewis and today I’ll be presenting a review of the factors and theories for explaining household recycling behaviour in the UK.

Slide 2: Structure

In terms of structure for the presentation I’ll give some background as to why study in this field is important and why I will be focusing on household recycling behaviour in the UK specifically.

I’ll provide a brief overview of the relevant literature as well as support for the influence of three different types of factors on recycling behaviour. Finally, I will compare some of the popular theories for explaining pro-environmental behaviour with a slightly newer approach. 

Recycling is becoming increasingly popular in many countries as a more sustainable waste management strategy than landfill which can be seen in the waste hierarchy of the EU waste directive where recycling is situated above disposal. As part of the EU the UK is obligated to follow the directive and has its own national recycling targets such as to recycle 50% of household waste by 2020. 

Most of the UK has access to curbside recycling collection but participation is mostly on a voluntary basis and there is a huge difference in the range of recycling performances of local authority areas of between 14% and 65% of household waste recycled. This demonstrates the need for research into how successful participation can be increased in the most cost-effective way.

In terms of the literature there is a large field of multi-disciplinary studies exploring recycling behaviour often with contradictory results which suggests findings are very dependent on the methodology used and where research is carried out.

It’s possible that some differences in results could almost be expected since human behaviour is affected by a range of interrelated factors however it hasn’t helped consistency in the literature that variables have often been given broad or vague definitions. 

The framework used here has been adopted from Barr et al and seems fairly comprehensive including environmental attitudes. Psychological variables and situational variables.

Two of the most popular theories applied to explaining recycling behaviour are the theory of planned behaviour and the theory of altruism which both have support in the literature but also limitations. The literature is continuing to expand and new novel approaches such as goal framing theory are being applied to recycling behaviour.

It was the idea of many earlier models that environmental attitudes/concern would directly lead to pro-environmental behaviour and there is a fair amount of support that positive general environmental attitudes leads to increased recycling behaviour.

But this hasn’t been the case in every study and some have found no difference at all in environmental concern between recyclers and non-recyclers.

This might be because individuals express their concern in different ways and so undertake some environmental behaviour but not others however overall large discrepancies have been found between attitudes and behaviours

When attitudes are particularly strong they can lead to the formation of personal norms. If recycling is part of a personal norm and an individual carries out the behaviour they may feel positive emotions such as pride or if they ignore these norms they might feel guilty.

Societal factors not only influence personal norms but can also cause individuals to act differently to their own attitudes. For these reasons when recycling is perceived as a social norm, individuals who are more sensitive to societal pressure may be more likely to recycle. 

However, this depends on how much emphasis is placed on being a community player in an area and some have suggested that other contextual variables may be more important

Convenience for households has been emphasised as incredibly important for encouraging participation by many studies and curbside collection may be one of the easiest ways to do this by reducing time and cost commitments needed to recycle and the containers might also remind people to use them.

Its been found that the higher the collection frequency the more people recycle however alternating recycling collection with the general waste collection may also encourage people to use the recycling containers more to save space in their general waste bin. 

In terms of reducing confusion it would be beneficial to have one recycling programme in place nationally however specific and frequent communications on how to recycle locally can also help. Accepting a narrower range of materials might also prevent confusion but in order to meet the national targets households will need to take part in increasingly complicated schemes

The theory of planned behaviour is a multi-attribute model which builds upon earlier models by incorporating a wider range of factors aside from attitudes such as social norms and with some consideration of situational factors in perceived behavioural control which is how easy or difficult an individual thinks an action would be. 

There is a lot of support in the literature such as in Kaiser and Gutscher since the variables have explained behavioural intention well. However, the theory assumes that decisions are entirely rational and made by weighing up the costs and benefits of action. 

So, some have questioned whether it can explain behaviour in situations where there is a high cost to an individual but they recycle anyway

Comparatively, the theory of altruistic behaviour is popular for explaining behaviour where there is a high cost to an individual with a lot of support for the idea that recycling is carried out as the result of a moral decision when individuals understand the consequences of their actions. 

Some have found that the theory improves prediction of recycling behaviour compared to the theory of planned behaviour but it still doesn’t consider many contextual variables believed to be important. 

Goal framing theory is a relatively new approach where three overarching goals or motivations are believed to influence decision making including a hedonic goal which is the desire to feel better, the gain goal to conserve resources and the normative goal to act appropriately. 

The theory has increased flexibility using smart norms instead of personal norms as it considers that individuals search both their memory and the environment for clues on how to act when the normative goal is strongest.

Personal values such as the importance of protecting nature and the environment and a consideration of others can strengthen the normative goal to act appropriately however situational factors making behaviour inconvenient can strengthen the other goals

In conclusion behaviour is influenced by a variety of factors including environmental attitudes, psychological and situational variables. 

The theory of planned behaviour may fail to explain recycling behaviour where there is access to curbside recycling costs to individuals have been reduced and there is no apparent benefit to taking part and likewise since recycling is a social norm in most of the UK, the theory of altruism may feel to explain differences in recycling performance. 

Goal framing theory may have greater theoretical flexibility for explaining recycling behaviour in a wider range of contexts however it is limited by the lack of empirical evidence applying it to recycling specifically. 

Further research is needed into recycling behaviour in other contexts aside from household recycling to determine whether it is more universally applicable.  

My dissertation will therefore explore the factors influencing recycling decisions in other contexts to households. 

The Harewood estate in West Yorkshire currently has no visitor recycling facilities but would need the support and participation of visitors to be cost-effective.

I am therefore hoping to work with the estate managers to install recycling facilities for visitors and investigate reasons for use/lack of use by the visitors to help inform recommendations on how the estate can improve participation.

I'll also use this as an opportunity to investigate whether situational variables and personal norms are the most instrumental in affecting decisions to recycle. 

Here is a list of the references used for the presentation and thank you for listening