This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility:

Once you drink the water out of a bottle or unbox a new phone, where do you put that trash? New research from the University of Georgia found your choice likely depends on how "nice" that trash is.

Over the last 20 years, manufacturers have reduced the thickness of plastic bottles and the weight of cardboard packaging to reduce cost and waste.

It's been a boon to companies' sustainability programs and waste-reduction efforts, but new research from the UGA Terry College of Business department of marketing published in the Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science found that people are less likely to recycle lightweight—flimsy—waste. In some cases, lightweight packaging was 92% more likely to end up in a landfill than its beefy counterparts.

"Things that are lightweight—if they feel flimsy, if they feel low quality—there's an assumption that they don't have value," said Sarah Whitley, assistant professor of marketing and co-author of the waste study. "There's a feeling of, 'I don't really feel bad about whatever this thing is. It's OK to toss it. It feels like trash; it is trash.'"

Lead author Lyndsay Loomer worked in brand marketing for a beverage manufacturer in Texas before earning her doctorate from Terry and joining the faculty as a marketing lecturer. She remembers when her firm introduced lightweight "crinkly" bottles to reduce plastic use in the late 2010s.

Source link