Messages in (plastic) bottles

Abstract

I stole a few days' free time a while back to go snorkeling in the deep blue of the Mediterranean. I am always surprised to be reminded that the sea speaks to those who go below her surface – a gentle tinkling sound made by the activity of marine life and shifting sand. I dove down to watch a shoal of gold-lined saupes (Sarpa salpa) dine on a patch of seagrass. It was an idyllic moment of flashing color in the warm, azure ocean – until a white plastic bag floated into the scene. It may have only been one bag, but we all know by now that the seas are home to millions of them. Environmental campaigners send out constant reminders that the world's oceans are being trashed, that the rainforests and other habitats are being lost or degraded, that too many greenhouse gases are being emitted. But looking around, one has to wonder whether these messages are getting through. Or could it be that we are sending the wrong type? “Well-meaning messages that simply highlight a problem may actually do little to help fix it – they could even make things worse”, says Robert Cialdini, Professor of Psychology and Marketing at Arizona State University (Tempe, AZ). “Pointing out, say, that walkers are throwing trash on the ground suggests a behavioral norm – that people are doing it. Research shows that this kind of communication may actually encourage people to join in this unwanted behavior – the perceived norm – rather than avoid it. Messages that suggest another norm, such as ‘Most walkers on this trail prefer to take their trash home’, have been found to be far more likely to induce a desired behavior. This is something many ecological campaigners have still to learn.” Plastics pollute the world's oceans and harm marine life. Campaigners do know, however, that securing an audience is important. And one way of competing in the clamor for eco-attention is to be bigger, bolder, and more engaging than the rest, and the Plastiki adventure was one of the biggest, boldest, and most engaging of recent years. The Plastiki was a boat made from some 12 500 plastic soda bottles and other recycled or recyclable materials. On 20 March 2010, it set sail from San Francisco – its destination Sydney, Australia, its aim to show that waste is a “design flaw” and that it can be a usable resource. The goal was also to alert people to the effects of plastic on the health of the oceans. The brainchild of adventurer David de Rothschild – who previously journeyed to both Poles to raise awareness about ecological issues – the Plastiki project was conceived when he read the 2006 UN Environment Programme (UNEP) report Ecosystems and Biodiversity in Deep Waters and High Seas. That report included a discussion on the impact of society's waste being dumped into the oceans, but it was the plastic that particularly bothered him. And the problem is big. The 2009 UNEP report Marine Litter: A Global Challenge highlights plastic as one of the major pollutants of our oceans. Indeed, some sources estimate that it makes up 60–80% of all marine pollution – in some places, plankton is outweighed sixfold by minute plastic particles. And who has not heard of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch (or of its recently discovered Atlantic counterpart), where the gyre currents swirl floating plastic detritus into a plot bigger than Texas? A million sea birds and 100 000 marine mammals may die every year from entanglement in, or by consuming, our dumped plastic, and who knows what is happening farther down the food chain. National and international media reported on the Plastiki's voyage, and you could track the position of the boat via the expedition's interactive website (www.theplastiki.com), where the vessel's construction was explained and the crewmembers introduced. You could even pledge not to use plastic bags, plastic bottles, or styrene foam cups. Expedition status was updated on Twitter and Facebook, and UNEP offered its congratulations as the boat sailed triumphantly into Sydney Harbor on 26 July, some 8000 nautical miles later. The Plastiki certainly raised my awareness of the effects of plastic in the ocean, but a question lingered: what was the behavior-changing message I could replay over and again in my head? Perhaps the single thing missing from this project was an immediately understandable take-home message that, rather than emphasizing the problems of plastic, invited people to behave differently the next time they had some in their hands. This could have been something, as Cialdini suggests, that would have set a behavioral standard to be followed – something like: “Most people think plastic should be recycled – or refused”. A starving, bewildered, plastic-entwined gannet I recently freed would probably have gone along with that.