Raising Awareness of the Edgewood Community to Improve
Recycling
By: Chris Conlin, Vicki Harris, and Tina Accola
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Raising Awareness of the Edgewood Community to Improve
Recycling |
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The purpose of this study was to raise the awareness of recycling in the Edgewood community to improve recycling behaviors. The experiment was designed to look at time and sign manipulation as variables that could affect recycling of aluminum cans, waste, paper, bottles, and plastic. Over a period of five months, one academic building was used to conduct this experiment. In Phase One (the first three months), recycling receptacles were left as they were with only “CANS, BOTTLES, PLASTIC ONLY”, “WASTE ONLY”, and “PAPER ONLY” signs above them; in Phase Two (the second two months), educational and promotional signs were placed above only designated receptacles. Cans, paper, plastic, bottles and garbage were sorted and counted weekly (every Wednesday) at approximately the same time. Time was also looked at as a variable that could affect recycling behavior since students, faculty, and staff might be consuming more canned and plastic beverages in one time period versus another. Our hypothesis was that promotional signs would increase the amount of recyclables in the recycling receptacles and decrease the amount of recyclables in the regular trash. At the conclusion of our experiment, the informative signs we used had little impact on the Edgewood community’s recycling behaviors. If we were to conduct this experiment another time, we would have more controlling variables and locations on the campus. We found that our experiment was not conclusive in finding how the awareness and education of recycling could make an impact on the Edgewood community’s recycling behaviors. |
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Introduction Methods Results Discussion Pictures Full Report (PDF File)