{"id":19616,"date":"2020-10-27T02:05:38","date_gmt":"2020-10-26T18:05:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/media-release\/curtin-study-finds-force-of-habit-key-to-environmentally-friendly-cup-reuse\/"},"modified":"2022-12-06T13:55:03","modified_gmt":"2022-12-06T05:55:03","slug":"curtin-study-finds-force-of-habit-key-to-environmentally-friendly-cup-reuse","status":"publish","type":"media-release","link":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/media-release\/curtin-study-finds-force-of-habit-key-to-environmentally-friendly-cup-reuse\/","title":{"rendered":"Curtin study finds force of habit key to environmentally friendly cup reuse"},"content":{"rendered":"

With many cafes happy to again accept reusable cups as they adapt to the pandemic, Curtin researchers have developed a behavioural intervention program that helps people make a habit of reaching for reusable coffee cups, which could have significant environmental benefits.<\/p>\n

The research, published in the Journal of Cleaner Production<\/em>, involved 156 participants who took part in a six-week program aimed at harnessing the power of habit to increase the use of reusable hot drink cups instead of disposable ones.<\/p>\n

Lead author Ms Elizaveta Novoradovskaya from Curtin\u2019s School of Psychology, said participants were randomly assigned to one of three interventions for the trial.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was a significant increase in the use of reusable cups in all intervention groups immediately after the intervention and at a six-week follow-up, compared to the control condition,\u201d Ms Novoradovskaya said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn one group participants were shown a short video<\/a> about how paper cups cannot be recycled, which aimed to instil pro-environment values, while the second group was asked to set a goal for themselves to use a reusable cup, which is a technique based on intent driving behaviour,\u201d Ms Novoradovskaya said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe third group was asked to keep their reusable cup in a visible place and was offered a choice of coloured cup, to encourage forming of habit, while the fourth was a control group that did not receive an intervention.\u201d<\/p>\n

Research supervisor Acting Head of Curtin\u2019s School of Psychology Professor Barbara Mullan said participants completed a pre and six-week post-intervention questionnaire assessing the strength of their habitual use of a reusable cup, their intention to use a reusable cup and their environmental values.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe found the interventions produced immediate and longer-term positive behavioural change. Regardless of the intervention type, participants used their reusable cups a significant amount more following the trial, and did so due to an increase in habit strength,\u201d Professor Mullan said.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs a result of the study, we recommend retailers provide customers with free reusable cups along with information on the environmental impacts of cup non-reuse, as the best way to encourage reusable cup use in the long-term.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis will activate environmental values and forming of cup reuse habits and could ultimately decrease the amount of landfill waste, with a longer-term goal of abandoning single-use cups, approximately 16 billion of which are thrown away globally each year.\u201d<\/p>\n

The research paper titled, \u2018My Cup of Tea: Behaviour Change Intervention to Promote Use of Reusable Hot Drink Cups<\/em>\u2019, can be found online here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Curtin researchers have developed a behavioural intervention program that helps people make a habit of reaching for reusable coffee cups, which could have significant environmental benefits.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4307,"featured_media":12341,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_oasis_is_in_workflow":0,"_oasis_original":0,"_oasis_task_priority":"","_relevanssi_hide_post":"","_relevanssi_hide_content":"","_relevanssi_pin_for_all":"","_relevanssi_pin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_unpin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_include_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_exclude_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_no_append":"","_relevanssi_related_not_related":"","_relevanssi_related_posts":"","_relevanssi_noindex_reason":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_research-areas":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,41,79,43,4],"tags":[],"research-areas":[],"class_list":["post-19616","media-release","type-media-release","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-campus-and-global-community","category-environment","category-health","category-medical-science","category-research"],"acf":{"post_options":{"":null,"additional_content":{"title":"","content":"","image":false},"related_courses":false,"credits":{"author":"","photographer":"","media":false},"display_author":true,"banner":{"image":false}}},"featured_image":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/Resized-for-web-Coffee_Photo-1000x500.jpg","author_meta":{"first_name":"Lucien","last_name":"Wilkinson","display_name":"Lucien Wilkinson"},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media-release\/19616","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media-release"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/media-release"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4307"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media-release\/19616\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12341"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19616"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19616"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19616"},{"taxonomy":"research-areas","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/research-areas?post=19616"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}