Factors Influencing Household Recycling Behavior

Oskamp, S., Harrington, M. J., Edwards, T. C., Sherwood, D. L., Okuda, S. M., & Swanson, D. C. (1991). Factors influencing household recycling behavior. Environment and Behavior, 23, 4, 494-519.

Conducted telephone interviews to study the recycling behavior, attitudes, and knowledge of 221 adults in a suburban city that had begun a citywide curbside recycling program within the past year. About 40% of the Ss reported participation in the program, and 58% claimed that their household had been recycling in other ways. Most demographic variables and general environmental attitudes and behaviors did not predict participation in the program; however, simple conservation knowledge did. The main significant predictors of curbside recycling were living in a single-family house, owning one's home, recycling by friends and neighbors, acknowledgment of environmental problems, and intrinsic motives to recycle.

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