The  project  is  funded  by  the  Ministry  for  Science  and  Culture  of  Lower  Saxony  and  the  Volkswagen  Founda?on  (VolkswagenS?Aung)  through  the  “Niedersächsisches  Vorab”  grant  programme  (grant  number  VWZN3037).  

Sustainable consumption of information and communication technologies (ICT) in the digital society – dialogue and transformation through open innovation A web survey on smartphones

M. Sc. Cand. Shirin Betzler Department of cross-cultural business psychology University of Osnabrück, Germany

Why sustainable consumption of ICT is necessary

Negative impact of our digital society:

•  Economic: Monopolization (google, amazon...) & destruction of economic and social systems

•  Social: Technostress & loss of privacy, (working) conditions in production and disposal countries

•  Ecological: great need of natural resources and electric energy, great amounts of electronic waste

17.09.16 2

…1,8 tons of raw materials is

needed to produce a PC with a 17-inch

display

…10% of the energy

consumption in Germany is taken up by

ICT (Manhart 2012)

…95% of all queries on the internet are put with

google (Statista 2014)

…50 % of the ICT devices are

not being recycled (Step Initiative 2014)

Theoretical approaches to predict pro-environmental behavior: TPB, VBN and emotion-centered approaches

17.09.16 3

Theory of planned behavior

(TPB, Ajzen, 1991) Pro-environmental

behavior = self-interested behavior

à Rational choice

Value-belief-norm theory (VBN, Stern, 2000) Pro-environmental

behavior = pro-social behavior

à Moral obligation

Affective approaches: Pride and guilt as self-conscious emotions

effective in the context of pro-environmental behavior

(e.g. Onwezen et al., 2014)

Hypothesized model

17.09.16 4

ICT  consump?on  

Inten?on  Subjec?ve  norm  

AQtude  

Ascrip?on  of  responsibility  Values   Personal  

norm  

Pride  +  guilt  

Problem  awareness  

Awareness  of  consequences  

Perceived  behavioral  control  

Value-based decisions

Rational decisions

Em

otio

n-dr

iven

de

cisi

ons

•  Adaptation and backtranslation of English items from existing research

•  Convenience sample (social networks, mailing lists) of N=271 students (25.5% men, 72.7% women, 0.4% other, 1.5% do not want to specify), Ø age 23.25 years

Procedure and sample of web survey

17.09.16 5

•  Focus of items: New acquisitions and recycling behavior of mobile phones, taking into account sustainability

Average useful life

17.09.16 6

0

0,5

1

1,5

2

2,5

3

3,5

4

4,5 current mobile phone

previous mobile phone

seen as generally appropiate

3,0

3,8

...

Dur

atio

n (y

ears

)

***

1,8

Reasons for acquisition of current phone

17.09.16 7

5,5%

7,4%

9,6%

12,5%

12,9%

26,6%

29,9%

50,2%

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60%

keep up with people around me

previous phone was stolen/got lost

other

latest/more recent model desired

received it with contract

new features were more attractive

old features not satisfactory (anymore)

previous phone was broken

(Multiple responses possible)

Devices which are not in use anymore

17.09.16 8

(Multiple responses possible)

5,2

5,2

13,3

19,6

33,9

64,2

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70

other

disposed in household waste

recycled

sold

given away

kept

%

Reasons for keeping devices

17.09.16 9

(Multiple responses possible)

Number of phones not in use % N

0 38,7 105 1 31 84

2 or more 30,2 82 N=166

9,6

28,3

44,6

64,5

other

don't know what to do

did not take care of it yet

might need them again

0 20 40 60 80 %

One word on the WHAT of consumption

17.09.16 10

82,66%

14,39% 1,11% No Fairphone Apple Nokia Samsung Google Sony Ericsson

Remaining: <1%

„Do you know of any mobile phone companies which in your eyes stand for sustainability?“

And others: Project Ara, Shiftphone, Phonebloks...

Conclusion

•  Rapid increase of ICT products means many resources, much energy and e-waste

•  Factors hindering people from recycling old devices: foresightful planning vs. ignorance of possibilities

•  Factors hindering people from extending useful life: built-in obsolescence vs. Consumerism

Rational, value-based and emotional factors need to be targeted in order to produce change in existing consumption patterns

17.09.16 11

Next steps

•  Validate postulated model via Structural Equation Modeling (SEM)

•  Cross-cultural comparison with Costa Rica

–  Value-based vs. rational constructs stronger influence?

–  Importance of social vs. Personal norm?

–  Which value dimensions on a national level influence the relations?

•  Collectivism, future/humane orientation, postmaterialism...

17.09.16 12

Thank you for your attention!

17.09.16 13

For more information on the eCoInnovateIT project, visit:

http://ecoinnovateit.de

or feel free to ask me!

References

Ajzen, I. (1991). The theory of planned behavior. Organizational behavior and human decision processes, 50(2), 179-211. doi:10.1016/0749-5978(91)90020-T Bamberg, S., Hunecke, M., & Blöbaum, A. (2007). Social context, personal norms and the use of public transportation: Two field studies. Journal Of Environmental Psychology, 27(3), 190-203. doi:10.1016/j.jenvp.2007.04.001

Onwezen, M. C., Bartels, J., & Antonides, G. (2014). Environmentally friendly consumer choices: Cultural differences in the self-regulatory function of anticipated pride and guilt. Journal of Environmental Psychology, 40, 239-248. doi: 10.1016/j.jenvp.2014.07.003

Stern, P. C. (2000). Toward a coherent theory of environmentally significant behavior. Journal Of Social Issues, 56(3), 407-424. doi:10.1111/0022-4537.00175

17.09.16 14