Turning plastic awareness into climate action: Lessons for the planet

Using successful communication methods to promote sustainable behaviours
Girl cleaning litter from a sandy beach

Turning plastic awareness into climate action: Lessons for the planet

Using successful communication methods to promote sustainable behaviours
Title: Turning plastic awareness into climate action: Lessons for the planet
Funded by: (funded by the European Union's Horizon Europe research and innovation programme)
Funding amount: €20,000
Location: Cornwall
Dates: June 2025 – January 2026
Project partners: Participating primary schools in Cornwall
91porn researchers: Hayley Hill (PI), Dr Jodie Fisher
 

Everyone knows about the environmental problems associated with plastic pollution, and rightly so… but what about climate change?

Objectives

Working with 164 children, their teachers, and their families, in seven Cornish primary schools, we have:
  • Determined how information about plastic pollution has been conveyed and retained by children, at school and at home
  • Used the techniques identified to help children design activities for other children that will embed the message of how sustainable actions can help to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and fight climate change
  • Discovered whether participation in this research project has resulted in the sustained adoption of sustainable actions, at home and/or school.
The children taking part were our citizen scientists, meaning they had an active role in analysing the data we collected from them to find how plastic pollution had been communicated so successfully. They used this information to design and create activities for other children to promote knowledge and understanding of small actions that everyone can take to fight climate change. 
Families of our citizen scientists and teachers were also be involved in the project, and questionnaires and in-person interviews were undertaken with them to determine the types of communication that the children have been exposed to at home and school. This data can help us to further understand where climate change knowledge has been learned, and used alongside our primary data to help the children to create activities that will really help to increase knowledge of sustainable behaviours at home, school and beyond.
This project inspired our citizen scientists to create engaging and successful communication methods, from board games to whole-class activities, that could be used in schools everywhere to highlight the importance of acting sustainably to help slow down climate change and look after the world we live in.
Child litter picking
Recycling illustration
Children holding a green sphere

Results in brief

Questionnaires completed by our citizen scientists during the first session showed us that school, family, TV and internet websites were their main source of knowledge for finding out about plastic pollution, and the problems associated with it, and how they discovered the actions they could take to prevent it. 
In the second session, our citizen scientists had a short climate change workshop, which included the results of the first session from both their school, and how it compared to the overall data collected from schools across the region, to remind the children of the data they had collected and to give them information on the types of activity they might like to design. 
This inspired a diverse collection of imaginative activities from across all the schools, with the potential to appeal to many different and diverse groups of people.
What methods have been used to successfully communicate plastic pollution knowledge and actions to children?
Top knowledge sources for plastic pollution and solutions, as identified by citizen scientists
Environment board game
Climate change poster
Climate infographic
Percentages of citizen scientists still taking sustainable actions four weeks after activity design session
Questionnaires completed by our citizen scientists during the third and final session were used to assess the impact of each child's participation in the project. These indicated that many of the children had adopted sustainable behaviours. 
Several of our citizen scientists reported taking action related to plastic pollution (such as recycling, litter-picking and using less plastic), however, 63% had adopted sustainable behaviours with direct links to reducing greenhouse gases (and therefore combatting climate change) immediately following the activity design session, and 56% were still carrying out these activities four weeks later.
In our final visit, we also asked whether taking part in the project had helped our citizen scientists remember the sustainable actions they were taking; 88% said they did, with many commenting that it was informative and helped to increase their understanding. They also reported that taking part had inspired action and was fun.
Download project overview

For more information on the project and the results, please download a copy of the project overview.

What is citizen science?

Citizen science is the public participating "in scientific research activities when citizens actively contribute to science either with their intellectual effort or surrounding knowledge or with their tools and resources" (European Commission, 2014). 
Citizen science can engage research participants in a range of scientific activities, from data collection and analysis to co-design of research questions and public engagement, with the aim of educating and informing citizens on the subject matter you are researching as well as fostering confidence in research results by allowing for a greater understanding of how science and scientists work. Citizen science projects must also contribute to research or produce new research-based knowledge.
The funding for this project has been provided by the IMPETUS Accelerator Kickstarter grant (funded by the European Union’s Horizon Europe research and innovation programme), who support citizen science projects to bring science closer to society and policymakers, and acknowledge the role the general public have in tackling the greatest challenges of our time through their participation in citizen science projects. 
Find out more about the project and citizen science on the .
IMPETUS is supporting our project. IMPETUS is funded by the European Union’s Horizon Europe research and innovation programme under grant agreement number 101058677. Views and opinions expressed are, however, those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Research Executive Agency (REA). Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.

People

  • IODP Science Office Scientific Communications, Applications and EDI Manager

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