The Effect of Strength of Commitment on Newspaper Recycling

To investigate the impact of commitment on newspaper recycling, thirty households were randomly assigned to one of the following three conditions: Information, where subjects were informed about the recycling project through a leaflet; Minimal Commitment, where subjects were asked to make a verbal commitment to recycle newspapers; and Strong Commitment, where subjects signed a statement saying their household would participate in the project. The frequency of participation and the weight of the newspapers recycled was assessed during a two-week intervention period and a two-week follow-up period. The results on both measures indicated that the stronger the commitment, the greater the degree of recycling. In addition, the Strong Commitment group continued to maintain these gains throughout the follow-up period. The effects of commitment were viewed as a successful application of the minimal justification principle and were contrasted with the outcomes of incentive-based programs which rely on powerful external inducements. This experiment explores the implications of the minimal justification principle in confronting a major environmental problem by investigating the impact of commitment techniques in promoting recycling behavior. It emerges in the context of the increasingly serious environmental problems produced by the excessive disposal of solid waste products in our country. For example, the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality estimates that in a typical year, Americans discard 30 million tons of paper, 26 billion bottles and 48 billion tin cans [1 ] . The collection and disposal of these products is costly, their disposal often degrades the environment, and their continual production and distribution depletes a variety of non-renewable energy resources.