23.06.08

 

Recycling is something that we can not escape living in Britain today. With initiatives all over the country to reduce, reuse and recycle its becoming less and less of a choice to recycle, and more a mandatory requirement. With reduced rubbish collecting and increased recycling rounds families are forced to recycle so that all the waste is collected. But who is responsible for recycling within the household?

Well it seems after extensive investigation to be a chicken and egg scenario. What came first? Were women always more concerned with recycling as an issue? Or is it that more companies, campaigns, initiatives and websites appear to target woman thus increasing their ability and need to recycle.

In Britain today generally a woman’s social attitude towards recycling is far more positive then a man’s. But is this because recycling is just more convenient for women? Or is it because women are still seen as head the primary care giver in a household?

There is without question a gender divide between priorities on sorting rubbish. Now don’t get me wrong some households do rely on the man to do it and some share the duties but in most homes it appears that women are responsible for the recycling.

In the same way going back through time women have been seen as the head of domestic chores it appears recycling in the modern climate has added to the stereotypical list.

But many previous studies on Social attitudes towards recycling seem to simply overlook gender as a factor.

Allison Fraley of the ecology action inc in America carried out an extensive study back in 1992 on social attitudes toward recycling but it appears gender was not something considered. She claims “ What I found in my research is that convenience is the number one predictor of recycling behaviour and monetary incentives are right up there is they’re big enough. Education and environmentally responsible attitudes are elusive predictors and not all studies confirm their influence on behaviour. Demographic influence on behaviour is not very convincing either. Although there was research that confirmed long term residence in a household predicted higher recycling rates and that higher socioeconomic status sometimes played a role in higher recycling rates. I conducted a survey that confirmed convenience and monetary value of recycling materials were the only factors predicting behaviur. Envinronmental knowledge and demographic variables had no effect on reported behaviour. Looking back though I think my knowledge measure was flawed because my test of knowledge was too difficult and also my demographics was restricted. Oh and one more thing a lot of research suggests that social influence carries a lot of weight- mainly in the form of people being motivated by their peers who are environmentally conscious.”

But do these attitudes translate across the pond?

Other studies carried out in the U.K delve into socioeconomic status and peer pressure as the residing factors of recycling habits. Dr Christine Thomas and DR J.P Parfitt issued a far more recent study into 'The effect of public understanding on recycling.' In short this study according to Dr Christine Thomas found: “ Recycling performance depends on a combination of factors including scheme design, operation, householder participation and the quality of that participation. The level of public understanding of what kerbside recycling schemes expect from them can have a significant effect on the quality of participation and on the overall scheme. This is because even when participation rates are high, scheme performance can be reduced by poor separation efficiency of targeted materials and the putting out of non-targeted materials for collection.”

So this already contradicts Allison fraley’s research as she claimd that education and environment does not affect the way in which we recycle. But once again the UK study fails to look into who is doing the recycling within the household. The UK study seems to think that a understanding of recycling is key to the performance and efficency of recycling schemes.

So going back to gender do women have a greater understanding of recycling?

Many women’s magazines, websites and fashion swap sites offer information on recycling and have ‘how to guides.’ On many of these websites there are also childrens sections which it is claimed women could be encouraging their offspring to view and learn. So with campaigns and companies potentially using women as their target audience they may have a greater knowledge of recycling, and this may result in more efficient and frequent recycling habits.

There has been a leading investigation carried out on gender and waste management which inspired the concept for this website and in fact made me want to go out onto the streets of the southwest and find out just who does really do the recycling? Battle of the sexes: are the women or the men really more concerned with their recycling habits?

Maria Muller and Anne Schienberg carried out the study into waste management in the Netherlands and they concluded: “ The very definitions of what is waste differs in women and men. What looks like junk to one may be reusable to the other. The Urban Waste Expertise Programme ( UWEP) shows that as men and women participate (or not) in managing waste within the household, their relationship to discarded materials may depend on who they are, as much as or more than on what they do. In particular the frequently domestic status of the woman may affect their general access to and control of resources so that the ‘waste’ materials or waste related activities may be the only ones which are available to them.”

So if this is correct women and men not only treat rubbish differently and have different attitudes and time management towards recycling but also make different amounts of waste and view their rubbish differently.

It appears after reading these studies and extensive personal research if women are from venus and men are from mars ……venus would seemingly have a much smaller landfill crisis.