Say No to More Plastic

Plastic consumption is increasing and wreaking havoc on the environment as it breaks down in ecosystems and spreads microplastics all over the world.

Microplastics are defined as pieces of plastic debris that are less than five millimeters long. These tiny plastic particles are often found in the guts of marine animals and there are major concerns about human consumption of these microplastics when we eat seafood. We know little about the potential harm of microplastics in our bodies and research is still being done to analyze the effects of microplastic consumption. 

Plastic generation in 2018 was 35.7 million tons in the United States alone with 4.20 million tons being attributed to just plastic bags. Plastic is shockingly unrecyclable as most materials are made out of mixed plastics, rather than just one type, making it nearly impossible for recycling facilities to break them down; less than 10 percent of plastics are actually recycled. Most plastic waste goes to landfills where it is more likely to make its way into the ocean and our food chains. Instead of focusing on recycling plastics, our efforts would be better spent trying to reduce the amount of plastic being consumed by individuals and society as a whole. 

For my communication project, I focused on addressing the plastic consumption habits of students at Eckerd College. My communication piece was a survey aimed at communicating with students about their opinions and practices when it comes to plastic consumption. If you have not already taken my survey you can find the link here. 

One thing I really wanted to make sure I did in this project is to avoid the trap of the deficit model of communication. The deficit model is a one-sided form of communication where the sender is only focused on getting information across to the receiver. Typically within the deficit model, the sender is the expert and the audience is seen as uninformed. I wanted to avoid the use of deficit communication because I feel like there is something to be gained from dialogue between the communicator and their audience. Although experts need to be able to share their knowledge I also think that there are important things that they can learn from their audience in return. The way I set up my survey I gave people some background information and data on the issue of plastic consumption and then asked questions that would give me insight into how other students viewed the problem. 

One of my hopes for this project is that it might inspire people to think more critically about their consumer choices and the power that we possess as consumers in the market. I am sure that many individuals believe that they have very little power in the economy if people are inspired to come together it is possible to create a successful consumer advocacy campaign to achieve our goals. I want people to be aware of the power that we as individuals have in our economy if we work towards a common goal. 

I also wanted to use visual rhetoric to get my message across to my audience. I used the imagery of a turtle eating a piece of plastic surrounded by an ocean filled with plastic to go along with my survey. This image uses an ambassador species of the turtle in communicating about plastic pollution. This communication can be pragmatic as it alerts and informs the audience about the issues with plastic consumption as well as constitutive because the kind of imagery used can invoke certain emotions to make people care about the issue.

My goal for this survey was to get at least 100 responses and achieved that with a grand total of 105 responses. Another goal of mine with this survey was to really see what drives people's plastic consumption and for this, I posed the question: What incentives would it take for you to decrease your plastic consumption?

I was very interested in what people thought about this question because I felt like it was a great way to see what people cared about and what might inform an effective campaign. The majority of people responded that they would need to see increased ease of access to change their consumption habits. This response makes sense to me as I feel like a big problem with reusable alternatives is that you cannot find them everywhere and that not everyone can afford them. 

One amazing resource for Eckerd students and others in the Saint Petersburg area is Eckerd's Reduce Single-Use website. This website has tons of information on actions individuals can take as well as a list of sustainable businesses in the area and so much more information on reducing plastic consumption. 

Something I would have liked to add to my project is face-to-face communication about this topic with my audience. Although I tried to avoid the deficit model and actually learn from the people I was informing I felt like having actual conversations with people might be a better way to engage people. Another positive aspect of face-to-face communication is that you can have running dialogue and actually work to build on one another's ideas. I also would have loved to take this communication to a wider audience that exceeds the scope of just Eckerd students to get more people involved with caring about this issue. To take this project to the next level I think the logical thing to do would be to use the information gathered from the survey to kickstart campaigns that really focused on what the majority of people wanted to see. For example, we could use this data to show that an effective campaign might be to petition local businesses to carry more sustainable alternatives to plastic products. 

 Sources 

Environmental Protection Agency. (n.d.). Plastics: Material-Specific Data. EPA. Retrieved December 13,       2022, from https://www.epa.gov/facts-and-figures-about-materials-waste-and-recycling/plastics

    material-specific-data 

Parker, L. (2022, May 2). Microplastics are in our bodies. how much do they harm us? Environment.

    Retrieved December 13, 2022, from

    https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/article/microplastics-are-in-our-bodies-how-much

    do-they-harm-us 

Pezzullo, P. C., & Cox, R. (2022). Environmental Journalism. Environmental communication and the

    public sphere. Sage.