Journal of Coastal Zone Management

Abstract

The Influence of Food Packaging on Consumers Sorting Behavior

Babak Nemat, Mohammad Razzaghi, Kim Bolton and Kamran Rousta

Among household solid waste (HSW) components, the waste of packaging has become a symbol of disposal in today’s societies due to its materials diversity, processing, and quantity. The packaging waste forms 30-35% of total HSW, on a global scale. However, the packaging waste could be valuable resource for material recovery if it properly separated and sorted by consumers. Waste separation rather than citizen’s duty is a moral obligation that demands actively engage a consumer with the process. Hence, the packaging communication ability with a consumer has been taken into consideration to encourage and leading a consumer through sorting food packaging waste. Different types of packaging may influence consumer behavior in different ways. So, the communication to be effective needs to specific knowledge about the influence of each packaging attributes on consumer recycling behavior. This research, therefore, sets out to identify, analyze, and evaluate the influence of different attributes of six-types of yogurt and cream packaging on consumer decision-making for sorting of packaging waste. The research conducted through an interview with 15 families in a medium-sized Swedish city. The result revealed that the sorting of packaging waste is not done to the extent it should be and choosing recyclable materials is by no means a guarantee that packaging will be sorted by consumers.
This is due to negligence occurred in the design of visual attributes, material selection and inconsistency between the form and different functions of theses packaging which is able to negatively influence consumer decision-making, during the sorting process.

Published Date: 2020-08-31;