Previous research has mainly explained littering through social norms — people do what others do. However, studies also show that people’s behavior in public environments is shaped not only by rules and norms but also by emotions and sensory impressions.
“If a waste disposal room is dirty and unpleasant, it does not always help that there are functioning systems for recycling and waste management. People who are sensitive to disgust simply do not want to spend time there, and this increases the risk of improper waste disposal,” says political scientist Jacob Sohlberg.
Littering is a major problem in disadvantaged areas
In the study, he and Senior Professor Peter Esaiasson investigated how sensitivity to disgust affects people’s waste disposal behavior. The research builds on their previous findings showing that littering is a particularly serious problem in disadvantaged neighborhoods.
“In fact, residents in disadvantaged areas consider littering to be just as serious a problem as unemployment and crime, which are two more widely recognized challenges,” says Jacob Sohlberg.
The researchers formulated three hypotheses:
- Dirty waste disposal environments lead to more improper waste disposal.
- People who are easily disgusted are more likely to dispose of waste incorrectly.
- The effect of dirty environments is stronger among people with high disgust sensitivity.
To investigate this, the researchers conducted three separate studies in socioeconomically disadvantaged residential areas in Sweden, Finland, and Denmark.
In the first study, the researchers collaborated with a municipal housing company in Gothenburg. Over three weeks, two waste stations were cleaned especially carefully every day, while eight others served as a control group. The researchers documented the amount of incorrectly disposed waste before and after the intervention.
“At the cleaned stations, littering clearly decreased, while the control stations looked much the same as before,” says Jacob Sohlberg.
Disgust sensitivity was measured
In the second study, an experiment was conducted with more than 300 residents in a disadvantaged area of Gothenburg. Participants were shown images of either a clean or a dirty waste station and were asked how they would act if they needed to use it. At the same time, their disgust sensitivity was measured through questions about things such as mold, dog feces, and cockroaches.
“People who saw the dirty waste station were significantly less likely to say they would open the hatch and dispose of their waste correctly. In that study, the effect was particularly strong among individuals with high disgust sensitivity.”
The third study built on the same experimental design but was conducted online with more than one thousand participants living in disadvantaged areas in Sweden, Finland, and Denmark. Here too, the researchers found strong evidence that dirty environments directly increased the risk of improper waste disposal.
Several positive effects of well-maintained waste disposal rooms
Taken together, the results suggest that municipalities and housing companies can reduce littering by keeping waste disposal areas clean and well maintained. At the societal level, this may have several positive consequences.
“In addition to improving the environment and quality of life in residential areas, it will probably also become easier to maintain order when an area is perceived as clean and well cared for. From a broader societal perspective, it is therefore important that waste and recycling are handled properly,” says Jacob Sohlberg.
