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Littering Education > Causes of littering > Who Llitters?

Who Litters?

In 1997, Williams et al (1997) carried out the world’s largest study of littering behaviour, and the first study comparing what people say about their littering behaviour with what they actually do. This was funded by the Australian Beverage Industry Environment Council.

Over a four month period, the research team visited the capital city of each Australian state and territory to look at littering behaviour in public places. The team included observers and interviewers, who recorded behaviour and attitudes respectively. They visited locations in each city that had been identified as attracting large amounts of litter, such as parks and outdoor shopping malls.

At each location, if observers saw someone disposing of rubbish, either in a bin or by littering, they communicated this to the interviewers by two-way radio, and described the person and location. The interviewers then intercepted the person and requested an interview on environmental attitudes and littering behaviour. The interviewer did not know whether the person had used the bin or littered, in order to reduce any interviewer bias.

A total of 8,968 observations were made during the study, and 23% of people were observed as being litterers. Of 2,694 interviews conducted, 19% were with people who had been observed littering.

This Australian study resulted in many findings and will be referred to throughout this section. One of the key findings was that ‘there is no such thing as a littering ‘type’. People of all ages and social backgrounds were observed littering and likewise, a variety of people used bins appropriately. This means it is not possible to simply divide people into ‘those that litter’ and ‘those that use bins’. Many people were observed both littering and using a bin. This reflects findings from a much earlier 1968 Public Opinion Survey for Keep America Beautiful Inc., which found that ‘everyone litters to some extent’.

Also, men and women were found to be equally likely to litter, the Williams et al (1997) study found that the people least likely to litter were those under the age of 15. People aged 15 – 24 had slightly higher littering rates than other adults, but this was only true when they were in a group. When this age group were alone they had lower littering rates than other adults. People over the age of 25 were most likely to litter when they were alone.

This study also showed that students and people who were not in current employment had
higher littering rates, whereas those with tertiary and post-graduate education had lower
than average littering rates.