IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jscscx/v2y2013i4p270-283d30291.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Sustainable Paper Consumption: Exploring Behavioral Factors

Author

Listed:
  • Bertha Maya Sopha

    (Industrial Engineering Programme, Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, Gadjah Mada University (UGM), Yogyakarta 55281, Indonesia)

Abstract

Although the paperless office (PLO) management system has been established with the goal of paper usage reduction, demand for paper has still showed an uptrend over the years. Given the substantial pressure on forest ecosystems due to a continued increase of paper consumption, understanding the behavioral aspects of paper consumption is, therefore, required. This present paper aims at exploring the factors underlying paper consumption behavior. Empirical data was acquired through a survey of 266 Indonesian students, involving both undergraduate and postgraduate students. A theoretical model, based on the Comprehensive Action Determination Model (CADM), was tested against the empirical data. It was found that the model received reasonable support from the data. Results indicate that reducing paper consumption behavior is strongly influenced by habit and, marginally significant, by intention. Furthermore, habit formation is influenced by both normative processes and situational influences. The results, to some extent, explain the PLO paradox in a way that the PLO program should have focused on breaking the habit of paper usage instead of promoting the benefits of PLO. Introducing a paper quota and rationing (fee) to new students, as the main target, is a potential policy intervention implied from the results.

Suggested Citation

  • Bertha Maya Sopha, 2013. "Sustainable Paper Consumption: Exploring Behavioral Factors," Social Sciences, MDPI, vol. 2(4), pages 1-14, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jscscx:v:2:y:2013:i:4:p:270-283:d:30291
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0760/2/4/270/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0760/2/4/270/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Nyrud, Anders Q. & Roos, Anders & Sande, Jon Bingen, 2008. "Residential bioenergy heating: A study of consumer perceptions of improved woodstoves," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 36(8), pages 3159-3166, August.
    2. Ajzen, Icek, 1991. "The theory of planned behavior," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 50(2), pages 179-211, December.
    3. Maréchal, Kevin, 2010. "Not irrational but habitual: The importance of "behavioural lock-in" in energy consumption," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(5), pages 1104-1114, March.
    4. Macey, Susan M., 1991. "A causal model of the adoption of home heating energy conservation measures," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 16(3), pages 621-630.
    5. Suziedelyte, Agne & Johar, Meliyanni, 2013. "Can you trust survey responses? Evidence using objective health measures," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 121(2), pages 163-166.
    6. Abrahamse, Wokje & Steg, Linda, 2009. "How do socio-demographic and psychological factors relate to households' direct and indirect energy use and savings?," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 30(5), pages 711-720, October.
    7. Corrado Di Maria & Susana Ferreira & Emiliya Lazarova, 2010. "Shedding Light On The Light Bulb Puzzle: The Role Of Attitudes And Perceptions In The Adoption Of Energy Efficient Light Bulbs," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 57(1), pages 48-67, February.
    8. Haas, Reinhard & Biermayr, Peter, 2000. "The rebound effect for space heating Empirical evidence from Austria," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 28(6-7), pages 403-410, June.
    9. Edwin T. Fuj & Michael Hennessy & James Mak, 1985. "An Evaluation of the Validity and Reliability of Survey Response Data On Household Electricity Conservation," Evaluation Review, , vol. 9(1), pages 93-104, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Nurwidiana Nurwidiana & Bertha Maya Sopha & Adhika Widyaparaga, 2022. "Simulating Socio-Technical Transitions of Photovoltaics Using Empirically Based Hybrid Simulation-Optimization Approach," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(9), pages 1-25, April.
    2. Spandagos, Constantine & Ng, Tze Ling, 2018. "Fuzzy model of residential energy decision-making considering behavioral economic concepts," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 213(C), pages 611-625.
    3. Faye V. McDonald, 2014. "Developing an Integrated Conceptual Framework of Pro-Environmental Behavior in the Workplace through Synthesis of the Current Literature," Administrative Sciences, MDPI, vol. 4(3), pages 1-28, August.
    4. Spandagos, Constantine & Baark, Erik & Ng, Tze Ling & Yarime, Masaru, 2021. "Social influence and economic intervention policies to save energy at home: Critical questions for the new decade and evidence from air-condition use," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 143(C).
    5. Bertha Maya Sopha & Dwi Megah Purnamasari & Sholeh Ma’mun, 2022. "Barriers and Enablers of Circular Economy Implementation for Electric-Vehicle Batteries: From Systematic Literature Review to Conceptual Framework," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(10), pages 1-23, May.
    6. Spandagos, Constantine & Yarime, Masaru & Baark, Erik & Ng, Tze Ling, 2020. "“Triple Target” policy framework to influence household energy behavior: Satisfy, strengthen, include," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 269(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Litvine, Dorian & Gazull, Laurent & Dabat, Marie-Hélène, 2014. "Assessing the potential demand for biofuel by combining Economics and Psychology: A focus on proximity applied to Jatropha oil in Africa," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 100(C), pages 85-95.
    2. Quaglione, Davide & Cassetta, Ernesto & Crociata, Alessandro & Sarra, Alessandro, 2017. "Exploring additional determinants of energy-saving behaviour: The influence of individuals' participation in cultural activities," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 503-511.
    3. Véronique Vasseur & Anne-Francoise Marique & Vladimir Udalov, 2019. "A Conceptual Framework to Understand Households’ Energy Consumption," Energies, MDPI, vol. 12(22), pages 1-22, November.
    4. Heesen, Florian & Madlener, Reinhard, 2021. "Revisiting heat energy consumption modeling: Household production theory applied to field experimental data," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).
    5. Spandagos, Constantine & Yarime, Masaru & Baark, Erik & Ng, Tze Ling, 2020. "“Triple Target” policy framework to influence household energy behavior: Satisfy, strengthen, include," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 269(C).
    6. Guo Li & Wenling Liu & Zhaohua Wang & Mengqi Liu, 2017. "An empirical examination of energy consumption, behavioral intention, and situational factors: evidence from Beijing," Annals of Operations Research, Springer, vol. 255(1), pages 507-524, August.
    7. Nieves García-de-Frutos & José Manuel Ortega-Egea & Javier Martínez-del-Río, 2018. "Anti-consumption for Environmental Sustainability: Conceptualization, Review, and Multilevel Research Directions," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 148(2), pages 411-435, March.
    8. Véronique Vasseur & Anne-Francoise Marique, 2019. "Households’ Willingness to Adopt Technological and Behavioral Energy Savings Measures: An Empirical Study in The Netherlands," Energies, MDPI, vol. 12(22), pages 1-25, November.
    9. Waris, Idrees & Hameed, Irfan, 2019. "Using Extended Model of Theory of Planned Behavior to Predict Purchase Intention of Energy Efficient Home Appliances in Pakistan," MPRA Paper 109612, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Ting Yue & Ruyin Long & Junli Liu & Haiwen Liu & Hong Chen, 2019. "Empirical Study on Households’ Energy-Conservation Behavior of Jiangsu Province in China: The Role of Policies and Behavior Results," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 16(6), pages 1-16, March.
    11. Kendel, Adnane & Lazaric, Nathalie & Maréchal, Kevin, 2017. "What do people ‘learn by looking’ at direct feedback on their energy consumption? Results of a field study in Southern France," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 593-605.
    12. Hélène Joachain & Frédéric Klopfert, 2011. "Emerging trend of complementary currencies systems as policy instrument for environmental purposes: changes ahead?," Working Papers CEB 11-047, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    13. Yazdanpanah, Masoud & Komendantova, Nadejda & Ardestani, Roshanak Shafiei, 2015. "Governance of energy transition in Iran: Investigating public acceptance and willingness to use renewable energy sources through socio-psychological model," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 565-573.
    14. Shis-Ping Lin, 2015. "Raising Public Awareness: The Role of the Household Sector in Mitigating Climate Change," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 12(10), pages 1-17, October.
    15. Lizin, Sebastien & Van Dael, Miet & Van Passel, Steven, 2017. "Battery pack recycling: Behaviour change interventions derived from an integrative theory of planned behaviour study," Resources, Conservation & Recycling, Elsevier, vol. 122(C), pages 66-82.
    16. Saeed Gholamrezai & Vahid Aliabadi & Pouria Ataei, 2021. "Understanding the pro-environmental behavior among green poultry farmers: Application of behavioral theories," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 23(11), pages 16100-16118, November.
    17. Aini, M.S. & Chan, S.C. & Syuhaily, O., 2013. "Predictors of technical adoption and behavioural change to transport energy-saving measures in response to climate change," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 1055-1062.
    18. Zbigniew Bohdanowicz & Beata Łopaciuk-Gonczaryk & Jarosław Kowalski & Cezary Biele, 2021. "Households’ Electrical Energy Conservation and Management: An Ecological Break-Through, or the Same Old Consumption-Growth Path?," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(20), pages 1-21, October.
    19. Liu, Diyi & Qi, Suntong & Xu, Tiantong, 2023. "In the post-subsidy era: How to encourage mere consumers to become prosumers when subsidy reduced?," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 174(C).
    20. Belaïd, Fateh & Youssef, Adel Ben & Lazaric, Nathalie, 2020. "Scrutinizing the direct rebound effect for French households using quantile regression and data from an original survey," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 176(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jscscx:v:2:y:2013:i:4:p:270-283:d:30291. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.