Prevention of littering through packaging design

Abstract

Littering is a social and environmental problem. Numerous studies have been performed trying to understand littering behavior and to find ways to influence it successfully. Various litter-reduction strategies have been applied with changing success. These have either focused on directly influencing the attitudes of the litterer or on manipulating the environment in which the littering behavior takes place. So far, the influence of the littered object has been largely neglected. This paper proposes that the characteristics of an object are relevant for its chances of being littered, and that this chance can be influenced through design. This is particularly true for packaging. Based on factors identified in literature as relevant to littering behavior, guidelines have been developed for packaging design. As literature shows, litter is not caused by a single type of behavior. Each type of littering behavior requires its own design strategies to reduce it, therefore a tool has been developed to assist the package designer in selecting those guidelines most relevant to his or her current design problem. This tool has been developed and evaluated with people that work in the field of packaging. The purpose of the tool is twofold, first to demonstrate the potential of the approach, secondly to present industry with a handle of tackling this challenge. The tool will be the basis for further research in the future into the relation between packaging design and littering behavior.