Sustainable developments, such as using less plastic, have gained momentum recently. But how can you encourage this sustainable behaviour among more people? That remains a social and scientific challenge. In their research, Meike Morren and Yue Dou take up this challenge. They investigate how shop location, convenience and price influence consumers' choice of fruit and vegetables without plastic packaging. The research is being conducted within the Impact Coalition Creating Responsible Societies and has been funded with seed money from the internal VU Amsterdam - UT call.
In their pilot study, Morren and Dou are collecting data on supermarkets in Amsterdam and Enschede. The aim is to create a database of convenience stores with information on prices and the amount of fruit and vegetables that are not wrapped in plastic. This data will be presented to a group of respondents to see how this information influences their shopping behaviour. 'Our ultimate goal is to inform people about the shops in their neighbourhood that offer fruit and vegetables without plastic. We are also doing this research from a personal drive and ultimately hope that people will make different and more sustainable choices,' Morren says.
Give up convenience for the environment?
In the pilot study, Morren and Dou are working with the SPAR supermarket on the VU Amsterdam campus and the COOP supermarket on the UT campus. In both supermarkets, plastic bags at fruit and vegetables will be replaced by paper bags and visitors will be asked about their experiences via a survey. The pilot should ultimately provide insight into the usefulness of the database and the feasibility of the intervention. Will people give up their convenience for the environment? Then Morren and Dou will use the results as input for the main study. In this study, they plan to conduct in-store interviews, among other things. 'We want to complete the information database and present the survey to a larger group of respondents. We also want to see if we can organise an intervention at other supermarket chains. That way, we can see if the appreciation for these changes is widely supported in society.'
For more information please contact Meike Morren, meike.morren@vu.nl.
