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Reducing environmental pollution: what affects the waste sorting of Chinese urban residents? The theory of planned behavior with community convenience

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Abstract

The increasing amount of household waste has caused harmful environmental pollution and land occupation problems. Implementing separate waste collection is considered an effective waste management method. This study used structural equation modelling (SEM) to investigate the garbage separation behaviour of 657 residents in Beijing. This study investigates the intention of residents to categorise behaviour from a psychological perspective, and previous studies on individual behaviour have overlooked the influence of their environment. Combining external factors of community convenience with the theory of planned behaviour (TPB) enriches research on environmental behaviour. The research results indicate that residents’ attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control have a positive and substantial impact on their willingness to participate in garbage classification behaviour. Community convenience as an exogenous variable plays an important role in directly and indirectly influencing personal garbage classification tendencies. The new model constructed has stronger explanatory power than the original model. The study also provides some practical suggestions, such as strengthening the dissemination of classification knowledge, improving residents’ environmental awareness, increasing investment in classification facilities by the government and community, reducing the perceived difficulty of classification behaviour by residents, and creating a convenient atmosphere for garbage recycling and utilisation.

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Funding

This work was supported by Heilongjiang Province Philosophy and Social Science Fund Project (21JYE394); Heilongjiang Province Philosophy and Social Science Fund Project (21JYD272); “Youth Research and Innovation Talents” Cultivation Plan of Harbin University of Commerce (2023-KYYWF-1044); Graduate Innovation Project of Harbin University of Commerce (YJSCX2023-770HSD); Graduate Innovation Project of Harbin University of Commerce (YJSCX2022-761HSD); National Social Science Foundation Major Project of China (23&ZD069).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Finance, Harbin University of Commerce, No.1, Xuehai Street, Songbei District, Harbin, 150000, Heilongjiang, China

    Dehua Zhang, Jiawen Li & Sha Lou

  2. Harbin University of Commerce, Northeast Asia Service Outsourcing Research Center, Harbin, China

    Sha Lou

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  1. Dehua Zhang
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  2. Jiawen Li
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  3. Sha Lou
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Contributions

DZ: conceptualization, methodology, software, and investigation. JL: writing—original draft, data curation, investigation, and software. SL: writing—review and editing, and supervision.

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Correspondence to Sha Lou.

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Zhang, D., Li, J. & Lou, S. Reducing environmental pollution: what affects the waste sorting of Chinese urban residents? The theory of planned behavior with community convenience. J Mater Cycles Waste Manag (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10163-024-01943-5

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