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I was skeptical of whether it was representative of 85% of the global population, or just the first-world. I've often thought (and heard that) environmental co
by lowkey_ 2y ago
I was skeptical of whether it was representative of 85% of the global population, or just the first-world.
I've often thought (and heard that) environmental concerns are secondary to economic, and that people in less prosperous countries don't care as much about environmental concerns as people in first-world countries who are secure in most areas of their lives. Surprisingly, this data says the opposite!
Sample size was:
North America: 2000,
Central & South America: 3500,
Europe: 8000,
Africa: 3000,
APAC: 7700,
On banning unnecessary single-use plastics being 'important':
Australia: 87%,
South Korea: 86%,
Mexico: 94%,
Uganda: 93%,
This may be obvious to some, but I really had the opposite notion until seeing this data.
- dumbo-octopus 2y agoThe response rate is so low as to be entirely meaningless. If you're content with sampling only 0.000001% of the population, you can get any results you want by simply selecting for the people who care the most by taking a bunch of time to lecture the individual if they seem like they'd vote the other way (oh no, you have to leave? but we didn't even have time to submit your vote yet... :( ), and wording the question in such a way to make the answer you want be the only reasonable response.
- orhmeh09 2y agoWhat do you think is a good sample size? How would you arrive at one?
- aunty_helen 2y agoThere isn’t one. Some things are not measurable by this standard and the stats relatively meaningless. 3000 people from a whole continent? Cmon
- kragen 2y agoplease see the introduction to statistical methods linked above at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40590633 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40590633
- dumbo-octopus 2y agoIf your question is asked entirely free of bias from a truly randomly selected population, you can use standard statistical methods to come up with a number based on your desired confidence interval. On the other hand, if you're an organization with your funding tied to the perception that people support your mission, and you're surveying whether people support your mission, I'm going to need damn near everyone in the population to respond to your survey before I'll buy it.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- pembrook 2y agoYep, asking people vague questions about the boogieman du jour is a questionable excercise at best. If a competing research team had gone out and done a survey with the question rephrased as, "Do you want a global ban on medical syringes and bottled water?" You might find out, amazingly, 92% of people strongly support single-use plastics!
- lolinder 2y agoThe actual question was [0]: > The United Nations agreed in 2022 to develop a global treaty to end plastic pollution. How important or unimportant do you believe it is to have global rules to… > Ban unnecessary single-use plastic products, e.g., shopping bags, cutlery, cups & plates? As survey questions go, this is actually a pretty precise question. [0] https://www.ipsos.com/sites/default/files/ct/news/documents/2024-05/Ipsos%20report%20-%20Single-use%20plastics.pdf https://www.ipsos.com/sites/default/files/ct/news/documents/...
- dumbo-octopus 2y agoProviding the context about the UN treaty makes it unnecessarily loaded. People are biased towards being agreeable, if you start out saying "everyone in the world agrees X, do you also agree X?", people are more likely to say yes than if you asked the question in isolation. The word "unnecessary" also adds bias, and skews the results: "Of course we shouldn't unnecessarily use plastic. Oh, but my personal water bottle and the bag I get my food in and the cutlery I use to eat it and the... well not those, those are very necessary: I need them to eat and drink!"
- TylerE 2y agoThat's a horrible question. What exactly is "unnecessary"?
- lolinder 2y ago> e.g., shopping bags, cutlery, cups & plates?
- GeoAtreides 2y ago> The response rate is so low as to be entirely meaningless. This calculator says you need a 385 sample size for a billion (or infinite) population: https://www.calculator.net/sample-size-calculator.html?type=1&cl=95&ci=5&pp=50&ps=1000000000&x=Calculate https://www.calculator.net/sample-size-calculator.html?type=... Please check the theory presented below the calculator, it explains why such a low number is enough for a confidence level of 95% that the real value is within ±5% of the measured/surveyed value.
- Slyfox33 2y agoThat's extremely dependent on who the 385 people are.
- orhmeh09 2y agoTFA goes into this a little > The samples in Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Canada, France, Germany, Great Britain, Hungary, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Poland, the Republic of Korea, Spain, Sweden, and the United States can be taken as representative of these countries' general adult population under the age of 75. > Due to the fact that the vast majority of the data was collected via Ipsos' online panels (India being the only exception, in which 1,800 were interviewed face-to-face and 400 were interviewed online), participation tends to consist of those who have access to the necessary technology. The samples in Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Indonesia, Ireland, Malaysia, Mexico, Morocco, Nigeria, Peru, Singapore, South Africa, Thailand, Turkey and Uganda are more urban, more educated and/or more affluent than the general population. While not nationally representative, the survey results for these countries provide a useful and unique indication of the direction of public opinion. > > Weighting has been employed to balance demographics and ensure that the sample's composition reflects that of the adult population according to the most recent census data. > > The precision of Ipsos online polls are calculated using a credibility interval with a poll of 1,000 accurate to +/- 3•5 percentage points and of 500 accurate to +/- 5.0 percentage points. For more information on the Ipsos use of credibility intervals, please visit the Ipsos website. Ipsos is fairly reputable in the field, FWIW.
- dumbo-octopus 2y ago
- Sparkyte 2y agoLots of medical supplies are single use plastics.
- verandaguy 2y agoMedical supplies also tend to have much better-defined disposal processes and ends-of-life than, say, plastic bags or coke bottles.
- Sparkyte 2y agoIrony is depending on what country you're in coke bottles might have a better disposal process than even medical supplies.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- londons_explore 2y agoPoorer parts of the world have (typically) much worse problems with litter. Poorer nations typically have no/few refuse collection services, and people often just pile up and burn their own refuse or dump it in rivers to take it away. That means poorer people see directly the litter rather than an 'out of sight, out of mind' approach.
- dumbo-octopus 2y agoMore importantly, the folks who take the time to response to these surveys in poorer countries are much more likely to be the affluent class who spends time in the kind of areas the surveyors are willing to visit, and has spare time on their hands to talk to people.
- wannacboatmovie 2y ago> Poorer nations typically have no/few refuse collection services, and people often just pile up and burn their own refuse or dump it in rivers to take it away. Would it not make sense then if they had a container with which to collect and responsibly dispose of the refuse? A plastic bag perhaps?
- dumbo-octopus 2y agoThey have to put the bag somewhere. Paying for a guy to come around and haul your garbage away every week to be responsibly disposed in a secure landfill is laughably out of budget for a huge chunk of the world population.
- Jackim 2y agoOr maybe we could tackle the root of the problem, avoid waste that doesn't decompose on the human timescale.
- wannacboatmovie 2y agoPlaces that still have open defecation and garbage in the streets have bigger issues to be solved before we deduce plastic bags are the problem. E.g. third world. Seattle and SF have banned plastic bags and the streets are still littered with human feces. Maybe for their next initiative they should pass out reusable bags for people to poop into. Sorry but a feel good measure to make grocery bags illegal doesn't move the needle for me when I still have to play hopscotch with literal logs of human shit. These priorities are hilariously out of order.
- lolinder 2y agoKeep in mind that in the methodology [0] the survey company emphasized that "the samples in Brazil, Chile, [...] Mexico, [...] and Uganda are more urban, more educated, and/or more affluent than the general population." It was an entirely online survey, so respondents in poorer places are more likely to be those with internet access and the spare time to be poking around on the internet. If you restricted the survey in wealthy countries to only the comparatively affluent I would expect you'd see similar percentages as we have here in poorer countries. I do love that Japan is such a major outlier (only 60% say it's important). They don't have the litter problem that the rest of us have constantly reminding us about the problem. [0] https://www.ipsos.com/sites/default/files/ct/news/documents/2024-05/Ipsos%20report%20-%20Single-use%20plastics.pdf https://www.ipsos.com/sites/default/files/ct/news/documents/...
- Havoc 2y agoOpinions/desires expressed and actual behaviours are very much two things. Spent most of my life in Africa & actual behaviours line up a lot closer with your instinct. If you're close to the poverty line practicality trumps environment. Choice between paper bag and plastic? Plastic obviously - it's more durable and has more uses later
- primitivesuave 2y agoHonestly, to me, the 85% statistic is meaningless because the survey is simply asking if you believe "plastic = bad" - a pretty common sentiment, especially in a third world country like India where plastic pollution is visible everywhere. I'd be more interested to see a survey that asks "would you be willing to pay 5% more at the grocery store for plastic-free packaging?" In less prosperous countries, the majority of consumers are more interested in saving money than saving the environment.
- coolspot 2y agoRealistically 20-30% more if you pack for example a yogurt into glass instead of plastic. Glass would be like half of net weight.
- CSMastermind 2y agoYou should consider that this is obviously a "study" meant to manufacture data to support the organization's favored position not a real investigation into what actual people think. Their conclusion is based on multiple surveys with different questions and methodologies but consider they did things like ask first, ": Before today, had you heard about a challenge called Plastic Free July, which encourages people to refuse and reduce single use plastics?" Told them about the harm single use plastics cause and then asked them, " How important or unimportant do you believe it is to have an internationally binding treaty to combat plastic pollution?" To which a large percentage of people obviously responded that yes it is important. In another survey they asked, "The United Nations agreed earlier this year to develop a global treaty to end plastic pollution..." with the following question then referencing this treaty, "The treaty will include global rules for participating countries. How important or unimportant do you believe it is to have global rules to:" To which one of th responses was, "Ban unnecessary single-use plastics.", another was, "Ban types of plastic that cannot be easily recycled", etc. And then they interpret agreeing that there should be a treaty to stop plastic pollution immediately after being given information about how bad it is to be the same as "Ban on Single-Use Plastics" which by and large no one surveyed actually said they wanted explicitly, nor were they asked.
- snapplebobapple 2y agoThe key word is "unnecessary". Everyone thinks we should get rid of unecessary plastic. Everyone also disagrees on what is unecessary. ask them if they would pay some percent more for a good to not have some specific plastic and it will be a resounding near unanimous no.