Development

I started off this week by conducting interviews. Throughout last couple of weeks, I’ve made a lot of assumptions based on my personal experience. I wanted to be able to back up my claims by actually asking people what they thought about plastic pollution, their plastic use habits and how they approached campaigns. I asked them a series of ten questions:

1. Do you reuse your plastic bags?

2. Do you use plastic cotton buds/Q-Tips?

3. Are you concerned about your plastic-use habits? If so, why?

4. Do you look out for plastic-free alternative products?

5. Are you aware that plastic is not biodegradable?

6. Are you aware how impactful our wrong deposing of plastic is? (e.g. that the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is approximately the size of Texas?)

7. Do you find the recycling system encourages to separate plastic from your general waste?

8. How do you feel about donating to the cause of plastic pollution?

9. If no, what is stopping you from simply donating?

10. Would you prefer to get something back (in terms of a physical object) when you spending your money for a cause?

For the interviews I selected a range of different people from our society to get a good overview of everyone’s opinion. The results were quite fascinating: For question one, everyone stated that they try to reuse bags, some more successfully than others. But it mainly revolved around the convenience factor and what worked well for everyone’s grocery habits.

The cotton bud question was basically added into the interview to see if people looked out for specific plastic products. There are numerous photos with cotton buds stuck up a turtle’s nose or mouth and thus block their airways. For this question, the answers were mixed. However, those people that did use plastic ones often times did not even realise that the cotton bud stick is made out of plastic. I guess it is just one of those products that people use without even thinking about it.

For the third questions, that asked if people were concerned about their plastic use habits, majority of people stated that they were concerned, at least to a certain extent. A few people mentioned that with a growing media interest in this subject matter, people are getting exposed to the aftermath of what they are doing. Thus, people think about what they use a lot more than they used to. However, I did have two people saying that they had never even thought about their plastic use habits. This also shows, that while people are starting to get educated about the issue, I believe not enough is being done to really show people the effect of their plastic-use habits.

When asked whether people looked for plastic-free alternatives, most people stated that they did not even realise that those alternatives existed. What I gathered from these answers was that since alternatives are just now starting to get developed, the selection of alternatives is limited and very expensive. Therefore, even if people take the time to look for an alternative, either the minimal choice or the price can put them off.

To try and understand how much people knew about plastic itself, I asked whether people knew that plastic was not biodegradable. Everyone stated that to some extent they knew that, but no one really knew anything else about the material, not that there are different types of plastic or that there even is a type of plastic that is supposed to be biodegradable. Again, this shows that people have basic knowledge about plastic, but do not know enough to properly realise the effects it is having.

Going from the individual’s effect on our environment, to the overall effect we are having, I asked people about their knowledge of the dramatic impacts our deposition of plastic is having on the environment. All participants stated that they knew there was plastic in the ocean and that the marine life was suffering. Their main knowledge came from videos and pictures showing fish surrounded by plastic bags or turtles stuck and deformed as a result of plastic wrapped around their shell. However, when I stated some facts about the full extent, most people were shocked. Again, this shows that while people are starting to be educated about the effects that plastic pollution is having, most people do not know enough to fully grasp the extent.

Trying to explore alternative options of solving this issue, I looked into recycling and asked the interviewees about their thoughts on the recycling system. Most people did not really care. I think as long as they did not have to do more work, people were happy to separate their waste. However, as soon as it became an inconvenience to them, they stopped.

Lastly, I wanted to back up my research about people’s responses to campaigns with actual evidence. Therefore, I asked about how people felt about donating to a cause and if they did not donate money, what was stopping them. Certain people stated that they just did not have the money to spend it on something without getting anything for their money. They considered it to be a waste of money. Majority of the people also mentioned that they were a bit uneasy about donating money. While the concept is great, people do not know what happens to the money. Basically, people have no control over what the money is contributing towards and the not knowing aspect seems to put people off as well.

Additionally, one of the interviewees said that she would love to help, but as soon as she reads things like “raising awareness” or “donating to a cause” she backtracks on her want to help. She said that she does not know what it is, but those words are just not very encouraging. I found that very interesting and believe this is because these words are quite dominant. They don’t persuade people to contribute without adding pressure and I think especially that pressure causes people not act.

To give people an alternative to the common donating campaigns, I asked the interviewees whether they would prefer to spend money on a cause but get something back. Basically, if they would purchase a product, some of their money would go towards a cause. Everyone said that they would much rather do that than solely donate money. The product would give them a greater incentive to spend money.

Overall, I was able to gain many great insights and prove my assumptions correct. People are being educated about plastic and its harmful effects on the environment, but clearly not enough! A lot of people, myself included prior to this project, do not know the full extent of the problem and do not necessarily see any problems with their plastic-use habits. As well as that, people seem to want to help, but only as long as it isn’t inconvenient for them.

To apply this towards my project; I now know that I want my project to spark some conversation about the topic of plastic pollution. People should find out more about the issue and more importantly be educated about ways to resolve this issue. Additionally, if I were to add some sort of campaign around my project, I would need to make sure that I wasn’t going to ask for mere donations, but instead, to be more successful, provide a product for people to purchase. This seems like a very similar approach to what 4Ocean has done with their company.

Lastly, these interviews have made me even more passionate about contributing a solution to this problem. I’ve realised that the lack of education society is receiving is making everyone unknowingly ignorant to the devastating harm we are creating to our environment, the marine life and consequently to ourselves.

Along with interviews, I also prepared for my prototype presentation for this week. We basically had to present everything we had done up to this point, including all our research, our idea generation and experimentations. Those insights from my interviews, along with going over all my other research and experiments helped me to further define my brief. This is my new 100-word summary of what my project is about:

“How can one of the most used materials in the world be so simple to use, yet so difficult to recycle? Plastic can be found in almost every product and continues to negatively affect our environment. My honours project aims to find new innovative methods to tackle this problem.

I will create a product, which is aimed to be sold with the purpose of feeding the profits back into helping the environment. The products will be branded as long-lasting goods, that help the environment by customers not solely providing financial aid to the cause, but by reusing plastic as well.”