Encouraging Sustainable Choices Through Socially Engaged Persuasive Recycling Initiatives: A Participatory Action Design Research Study

Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) research has illuminated how technology can influence users’ awareness of their environmental impact and the potential for mitigating these impacts. From hot water saving to food waste reduction, researchers have systematically and widely tried to find pathways to sp...

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Main Authors: Emilly Marques da Silva, Daniel Schneider, Claudio Miceli, António Correia
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2025-01-01
Series:Informatics
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.mdpi.com/2227-9709/12/1/5
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author Emilly Marques da Silva
Daniel Schneider
Claudio Miceli
António Correia
author_facet Emilly Marques da Silva
Daniel Schneider
Claudio Miceli
António Correia
author_sort Emilly Marques da Silva
collection DOAJ
description Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) research has illuminated how technology can influence users’ awareness of their environmental impact and the potential for mitigating these impacts. From hot water saving to food waste reduction, researchers have systematically and widely tried to find pathways to speed up achieving sustainable development goals through persuasive technology interventions. However, motivating users to adopt sustainable behaviors through interactive technologies presents significant psychological, cultural, and technical challenges in creating engaging and long-lasting experiences. Aligned with this perspective, there is a dearth of research and design solutions addressing the use of persuasive technology to promote sustainable recycling behavior. Guided by a participatory design approach, this investigation focuses on the design opportunities for leveraging persuasive and human-centered Internet of Things (IoT) applications to enhance user engagement in recycling activities. The assumption is that one pathway to achieve this goal is to adopt persuasive strategies that may be incorporated into the design of sustainable applications. The insights gained from this process can then be applied to various sustainable HCI scenarios and therefore contribute to HCI’s limited understanding in this area by providing a series of design-oriented research recommendations for informing the development of persuasive and socially engaged recycling platforms. In particular, we advocate for the inclusion of educational content, real-time interactive feedback, and intuitive interfaces to actively engage users in recycling activities. Moreover, recognizing the cultural context in which the technology is socially situated becomes imperative for the effective implementation of smart devices to foster sustainable recycling practices. To this end, we present a case study that seeks to involve children and adolescents in pro-recycling activities within the school environment.
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spelling doaj-art-fb85c72280d14102b93363ed1df4e1b92025-08-20T01:49:00ZengMDPI AGInformatics2227-97092025-01-01121510.3390/informatics12010005Encouraging Sustainable Choices Through Socially Engaged Persuasive Recycling Initiatives: A Participatory Action Design Research StudyEmilly Marques da Silva0Daniel Schneider1Claudio Miceli2António Correia3Postgraduate Program in Informatics, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro 21941-916, BrazilPostgraduate Program in Informatics, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro 21941-916, BrazilSystems Engineering and Computer Science Program, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro 21941-972, BrazilFaculty of Information Technology, University of Jyväskylä, P.O. Box 35, FI-40014 Jyväskylä, FinlandHuman-Computer Interaction (HCI) research has illuminated how technology can influence users’ awareness of their environmental impact and the potential for mitigating these impacts. From hot water saving to food waste reduction, researchers have systematically and widely tried to find pathways to speed up achieving sustainable development goals through persuasive technology interventions. However, motivating users to adopt sustainable behaviors through interactive technologies presents significant psychological, cultural, and technical challenges in creating engaging and long-lasting experiences. Aligned with this perspective, there is a dearth of research and design solutions addressing the use of persuasive technology to promote sustainable recycling behavior. Guided by a participatory design approach, this investigation focuses on the design opportunities for leveraging persuasive and human-centered Internet of Things (IoT) applications to enhance user engagement in recycling activities. The assumption is that one pathway to achieve this goal is to adopt persuasive strategies that may be incorporated into the design of sustainable applications. The insights gained from this process can then be applied to various sustainable HCI scenarios and therefore contribute to HCI’s limited understanding in this area by providing a series of design-oriented research recommendations for informing the development of persuasive and socially engaged recycling platforms. In particular, we advocate for the inclusion of educational content, real-time interactive feedback, and intuitive interfaces to actively engage users in recycling activities. Moreover, recognizing the cultural context in which the technology is socially situated becomes imperative for the effective implementation of smart devices to foster sustainable recycling practices. To this end, we present a case study that seeks to involve children and adolescents in pro-recycling activities within the school environment.https://www.mdpi.com/2227-9709/12/1/5community engagementInternet of Things (IoT)participatory action design researchpersuasive technologyrecyclingsmart bins
spellingShingle Emilly Marques da Silva
Daniel Schneider
Claudio Miceli
António Correia
Encouraging Sustainable Choices Through Socially Engaged Persuasive Recycling Initiatives: A Participatory Action Design Research Study
Informatics
community engagement
Internet of Things (IoT)
participatory action design research
persuasive technology
recycling
smart bins
title Encouraging Sustainable Choices Through Socially Engaged Persuasive Recycling Initiatives: A Participatory Action Design Research Study
title_full Encouraging Sustainable Choices Through Socially Engaged Persuasive Recycling Initiatives: A Participatory Action Design Research Study
title_fullStr Encouraging Sustainable Choices Through Socially Engaged Persuasive Recycling Initiatives: A Participatory Action Design Research Study
title_full_unstemmed Encouraging Sustainable Choices Through Socially Engaged Persuasive Recycling Initiatives: A Participatory Action Design Research Study
title_short Encouraging Sustainable Choices Through Socially Engaged Persuasive Recycling Initiatives: A Participatory Action Design Research Study
title_sort encouraging sustainable choices through socially engaged persuasive recycling initiatives a participatory action design research study
topic community engagement
Internet of Things (IoT)
participatory action design research
persuasive technology
recycling
smart bins
url https://www.mdpi.com/2227-9709/12/1/5
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