TY - JOUR
T1 - Knowing What It Makes
T2 - How Product Transformation Salience Increases Recycling
AU - Winterich, Karen Page
AU - Nenkov, Gergana Y.
AU - Gonzales, Gabriel E.
N1 - Funding Information:
The authors greatly appreciate support from Penn State’s Sustainability Institute, including Doug Goodstein, Lydia Vandenbergh, Kaitlynn Hamaty, Kayla Susko, Hannah Samuels, and Jillian Barskey, as well as Nadine Davitt, David Manos, and University Housing staff. They are very grateful to Nate Allred, Felix Xu, Ali Wald, and Rachel KinKade for weighing tailgating trash in Study 5 and Micah Houston, Claire Pomorsky, and Kristin Consorti for helping with the dirty job of waste audits in Study 6. The authors also thank Kirk French and Nicholas Triozzi for their assistance with the ArcGIS app in Study 5 as well as Ronald Johnson and Rita Young for their assistance with data collection. They appreciate data analysis assistance from Steven Lacey, Hans Baumgartner, and Linda Salisbury. The authors thank Jessica Gamlin for the idea to use the Madewell Denim Recycling campaign as study stimuli and are grateful for comments from Hristina Nikolova and the Penn State Marketing Department’s Consumer Behavior lab group. The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This research was funded by a Sustainability Grant from the Smeal College of Business, Pennsylvania State University and by a research grant from Boston College.
Funding Information:
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This research was funded by a Sustainability Grant from the Smeal College of Business, Pennsylvania State University and by a research grant from Boston College.
Publisher Copyright:
© American Marketing Association 2019.
PY - 2019/7/1
Y1 - 2019/7/1
N2 - Recycling campaigns abound, but do consumers think about what becomes of those recyclables? This research proposes that product transformation salience (thinking about recyclables turning into new products) increases recycling. The authors theorize that consumers are inspired by the transformation of recyclables into new products and that this inspiration motivates them to recycle. The authors demonstrate the effect of product transformation messages on recycling behavior using a recycling campaign (Study 1) and advertisements for products made from recycled plastic (Study 2). Study 3 demonstrates the mediating role of inspiration. Then, three field studies provide robust support for the transformation salience effect through click-through rates for recycling advertisements (Study 4), recycling rates during pre–football game tailgating (Study 5), and a reduction in the amount of recyclable materials incorrectly placed in the landfill bin by students in a university residence hall (Study 6). The authors discuss implications for the design of recycling campaigns and positioning of recycled products in the marketplace as well as theoretical contributions regarding the roles of transformation salience and inspiration in encouraging recycling and other sustainable behaviors.
AB - Recycling campaigns abound, but do consumers think about what becomes of those recyclables? This research proposes that product transformation salience (thinking about recyclables turning into new products) increases recycling. The authors theorize that consumers are inspired by the transformation of recyclables into new products and that this inspiration motivates them to recycle. The authors demonstrate the effect of product transformation messages on recycling behavior using a recycling campaign (Study 1) and advertisements for products made from recycled plastic (Study 2). Study 3 demonstrates the mediating role of inspiration. Then, three field studies provide robust support for the transformation salience effect through click-through rates for recycling advertisements (Study 4), recycling rates during pre–football game tailgating (Study 5), and a reduction in the amount of recyclable materials incorrectly placed in the landfill bin by students in a university residence hall (Study 6). The authors discuss implications for the design of recycling campaigns and positioning of recycled products in the marketplace as well as theoretical contributions regarding the roles of transformation salience and inspiration in encouraging recycling and other sustainable behaviors.
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U2 - 10.1177/0022242919842167
DO - 10.1177/0022242919842167
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85070327200
SN - 0022-2429
VL - 83
SP - 21
EP - 37
JO - Journal of Marketing
JF - Journal of Marketing
IS - 4
ER -