Financing electronic waste recycling

Nixon, Hilary, and Jean-Daniel M. Saphores. 2007. “Financing electronic waste recycling Californian households’ willingness to pay advanced recycling fees.” Journal of Environmental Management 84 (4): 547-559. doi:10.1016/j.jenvman.2006.07.003.

This study is focused on one topic: paying a fee to recycle electronic waste such as computers or television sets and how large a fee were participants willing to spend as a percentage of the purchase price of their new item.

There were too few respondents willing to pay 10%, so those responses were combined with those willing to pay five percent.

The study suggests that a majority of Californians support a modest advanced recycling fee of 1%. Generally, the more education a participant had, the more likely they were to pay advanced recycling fees. To narrow it down, respondents between ages 18 to 35 years were the most willing to pay 5% advanced recycling fee whereas those over 35 years old were the least likely. The study also suggested that if the recycling facility was more than 5 miles away from a participant the likelihood of participation dropped.

It comes as a surprise that those who make $40,000 per year or less are much more likely to pay the 5% advanced recycling fee. One theory is that their feeling that their local environment quality is so poor that they might be more likely to pay to improve it.

The authors noted that the findings of this study could not necessarily be extended throughout the rest of the country due to certain biases such as sample bias from mail surveys and a tendency towards older participants.

Factors Influencing Household Recycling Behavior

Oskamp, Stuart, Maura J. Harrington, Todd C. Edwards, Deborah L. Sherwood, Shawn M. Okuda, and Deborah C. Swanson. 1991. “Factors Influencing Household Recycling Behavior.” Environment and Behavior 23 (4) (July 1): 494 -519. doi:10.1177/0013916591234005.

This is an earlier recycling study (1991) that examines the recycling behavior of a small city in California. The variables include age, education, homeownership and several other factors. And how they affect or influence recycling behavior, especially curbside pick-up, which was relatively new at that time.

The outcome of this study is that it confirmed some past research “that different environmentally responsible behaviors have different patterns of antecedents.” However there were significant differences when curbside recycling was introduced.

The first reason given was the convenience of having the collection come to you on a regular basis. The second reason was that it took less space in the home to recycle. The third reason is that the city provides the homeowner with the containers to put the recycling in. The fourth reason is, for lack of a better phrase, peer pressure. The neighbors are doing it.

One major predictor for positive recycling behavior is home ownership, especially if it is a single family home, especially if the family owns it. Another positive predictor was if there had been a past behavior of recycling for cash.

Recycling behavior, in general was more likely in homes where there was a higher level of education attained, and the level of conservation knowledge. It is interesting to note that recycling behavior was not a predictor of other environmentally friendly behavior.

This study has one flaw from the start; the sample was quite small compared to the population, and therefore may have had a higher margin of error.