Combatting sustainability fatigue 

You head into the supermarket, your head heavy with thousands of pro-environment guidelines to follow. Ten minutes later and all you have is milk and impatience. You’re way behind schedule and still can’t find the recommended detergent brand. The shelf stocker has never heard of it, so you reach for the most familiar brand. This keeps happening until twelve aisles later and you’re checking out with a sense of guilt and inadequacy.

For many casual sustainability fans, this is a weekly occurrence.

It’s a well-kept secret: living sustainably is exhausting. Public figures and advocates make it look easy: does it really only take ‘five top tips’ to act appropriately within a vast and complex waste management industry? It’s a start, but in reality, sustainable living requires a time commitment, great mental energy and a strong base knowledge about the field. Any interference and the plan can derail, easily.

But the good news is that the research community is advancing knowledge on what barriers get in the way of responsible behaviour, and how to overcome them. With a deeper knowledge of some of the emerging insights and trends, you can strengthen your ability to act and empower others.

Insight 1: Your intention is act sustainably is weak, but you can strengthen it

In a 2016 study, The University of Tasmania aimed to understand this ‘intention-behavour gap ’ specifically among pro-environmental Australian customers (n=722). In other words, they wanted to understand why people who intend to make sustainable choices might leave the supermarket with more harmful alternatives (also known as ‘hypocritical shopping’).

They evaluated a range of factors and saw that it only takes a discount on a competitor product, a small inconvenience in locating an item or an unclear label for a well-intended customer to give up acting sustainability on a supermarket run. But they also found that the most powerful resistance is: plan strength . In essence, the more concrete a customer’s plan is, the more successful they’ll be at achieving their sustainably goal.

While this is not a groundbreaking idea, it’s how you implement it that makes the difference. The study suggests that when well-intended friends (or you) reflect on the value they place on the environment, ask when they’re going shopping next and what items they will seek out to buy . It will strengthen their intention in the face of all the above distractions.

Insight 2: You secretly doubt your actions will make an impact, but they do

After plan strength, the Tasmanian study found that a belief that our behaviour will make a difference is key for translating an intention into action. This is no small feat – in a sea of information it’s hard to understand the most effective actions.

A 2019 study from CSRIO sheds light on how vast the discrepancy can be. They measured Australians’ faith in the recycling system (n=1,244), and found that 75% of Victorians believed that less than half of items in kerbside recycling bins will take on a new life. However, The Victorian Government reported it’s actually around 95% of items which are reprocessed and become new products . This is a significant discrepancy, and these kinds of doubts in the system are reasoned to be a barrier for pro-environmental activity.

Have confidence in the potential of your recycling bin (just make sure you avoid contamination from poor sorting ). And if you lack confidence in your sustainability actions, seek out clarifying data.

Insight 3: Watch out for genuinely pro-environment businesses vs. those who create a perception

In their Australian Retail Outlook 2020 report, Global advisory firm KPMG notes that “more consumers now choose to buy brands based on their social and environmental impact – and retail boards have to comply or risk the costs.” In other words, corporations are catching on to the importance of sustainability so will try to take advantage of this shift.

More corporate investment into sustainably practices can be a good thing, but it may blur the lines between firms with genuine sustainable intentions and bandwagoners.

Some organisations will embrace the movement by revisiting their company ethos and aligning their operations accordingly, but other firms may do the bare minimum to earn a label or act sustainably as a one-off initiative to create a perception of sustainability.

You can combat this by looking past the brand name, and find out which corporation is the manufacturer. And if you agree with their approach and vision, you can reward them by purchasing the product.

Retail firms track their sales numbers very closely and with great detail, so you may be part of a significant growth statistic that stimulates further sustainably investment. It may not take much to prove to executives that their sustainable investments are working.

Your potential to drive change is enormous when you focus on the right things

It’s a complex world and it’s easy to feel overwhelmed by the excess of information. But with a good plan to back up your intentions, confidence in the right parts of the recycling ecosystem and an ability to reward those who genuinely invest in sustainability, you can be disproportionately powerful in supporting the environment.

Tom Champion is a published author and consultant who is passionate about the overlap of psychology, business and sustainability.