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Re: peer reviewed articles on environmental communication
2007-11-04 10:05:53 UTC
Samantha and Ellen-
I have come across one article that may be particularly helpful. If you do a search on GoggleScholar using the key words Cialdini and environment, the first article that comes up is "Creating Normative Messages to Protect the Environment" from 2003. Some of Cialdini's other work may also be of interest to you. Specific to water conservation, there is a Lapinski article on water conservation attitudes and behaviors that can also be found on GoogleScholar. Unfortunately, there isn't a lot of recent work (at least that I've found so far) relating specifically to environmental campaigns. I do know of a couple people doing work relating to global warming, so there may be several articles coming out in the next few years.
Best,
Angela
Graduate Student
School of Communication
The Ohio State University -
cloth diapers
2007-10-18 19:06:59 UTC
I have resisted emailing my thoughts on cloth diapers until now since the original inquiry pertained to programs that encouraged the use of cloth diapers. I know of none. However, I am a mom who does the hybrid system, and I've been very happy with that decision. We use cloth during the day, and disposables at night and on the road. We do use the rice liners in the cloth to avoid having to rinse the diapers in the toilet. Though there are many barriers to the use of cloth diapers, I think many of them could be addressed through a program without too much difficulty. (At least no more than any other CBSM program.) I mainly want to address the general lack of knowledge about cloth diapers.
One of my difficulties in going the cloth diaper route was choosing which diaper to use. When I first started looking, I wasn't familiar with all the terminology- pocket diapers, all in one, etc. Even once I figured it out, I was confused about why there were so many options and what the various benefits would be. Which should I pick? It was a bit overwhelming. I ended up buying both FuzziBunz and MotherEase. I hardly use the ME anymore, but LOVE the FuzziBunz. That was an expensive experiment. I prefer the all in one diapers just because there is one less step in putting the diaper on. Plus (and this is a big one), I wanted to hang my diapers dry to maximize the enviro benefit and reduce the cost of using cloth. My ME were always stiff after hanging dry, but the FB were ready to go. My daughter has recently been enrolled in daycare (home setting). I started off sending only disposables for during the day. However, I asked Heather if she would try out the cloth diapers. If she didn't like them, we could go back to disposable. She loves them too! She went on and on about them. She even gave her husband a demonstration. I think she was worried about the gross-ness factor, but she likes the cloth better than the disposable in that area too. She gets to flush the gross-ness instead of just putting in a smelly pail.
That was a long way of saying, I think if parents could just try out different diapering systems on a trial basis for a week or so the adoption of cloth diaper use would go up. A lot of the general population still thinks of pins and folding diapers when you say cloth diapers. If people do start to look into it, the number of options can be a bit overwhelming. It's harder to get over that barrier bc so few stores actually carry cloth diapers, so you can't go and "play" with any of the options.
Re: the environmental debate, Mothering magazine has addressed this topic several times over the years. I have attached a link to one of the more recent articles below. However, I quick search from their home page (mothering.com) will reveal several others. http://www.mothering.com/guest_editors/quiet_place/138.html One last thing to consider. I haven't seen anyone mention the diaper-free method. Now, I'm not crazy. I don't think we can get people to stop using diapers. However, this can be implemented as part of a hybrid system. Unfortunately, I didn't do this (and I wish I had), but I think this would really aid in early potty training. I have read where parents will take their children to the toilet when they notice them giving the "I'm about to go" look. It would have been easy enough to do for my daughter when she was younger, and had a very distinct look when she was about to poop. Like I said, I missed that window of opportunity, but plan to try it for our next one.
Angela Poe Dossett
Graduate Student
School of Communication
The Ohio State University Columbus, OH
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