| dc.description.abstract | Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) or simply, electronic waste (e-waste), is a rather recent addition to the waste landscape. Nevertheless, growing incomes and rapid technological advancement has turned e-waste into a menace. Considered to be the fastest growing waste stream, e-waste is now a major threat to the environment and human health. Unlike other wastes, e-waste possesses high value owing to the presence of precious metals. Further, since e-waste also consists of toxic elements, its handling carries higher health and environmental risk. This risk is amplified in growing economies such as India where e-waste is mostly processed by the informal sector using hazardous practices. In addition, India is socio-economically and culturally much different from developed countries. For these reasons, an “Indian” approach to tackling e-waste is more effective than merely importing best practices from advanced countries. Research literature on e-waste is mostly concentrated on estimation of quantities, environmental and health hazards, and policy mechanisms for effective management. There is dearth of research studies exploring various aspects of consumer behavior in relation to e-waste generation and its management. Such studies are very few or non-existent in the Indian context. We tried to address this gap in three phases.
The first phase was aimed at developing a conceptual framework towards understanding environmental behavior of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) consumers in relation to e-waste generation. It involved conceptualizing Environmental Behaviour (EB) as a function of Attitudinal Factors, Contextual Forces, Personal Capabilities, and Demographic variables. The next phase was aimed at empirically validating this framework in the Indian context. All the variables were operationalized and an online survey was conducted to collect data from ICT consumers. 347 responses were selected for further data analysis. Eight distinct EBs and four Attitudinal Factors emerged from Exploratory Factor Analysis. Context Indices (CIs) were computed and Demographic variables were recoded. The eight EBs were prioritized w.r.t to their impact and classified into three groups: transformationist, reformist, and status-quoist behaviors.. Thereafter, multiple regression analysis was used to identify key variables influencing each of the eight EBs. It was found that transformationist behavior(s) was(were) primarily influenced by Attitudinal Factors; status-quoist behaviors by Contextual Forces; reformist behaviors by both. In the last phase, we segmented the ICT consumers into three groups based on eight EBs using k-means cluster analysis. The groups were named as Conscious Consumers, Clueless Consumers, and Passive Consumers. We profiled these groups based on attitudinal variables using ANOVA with post-hoc tests and demographic variables using Chi-square test for association. It was found that these groups differed significantly on Attitudinal Factors and Personal Capabilities. Even though demographical variables did not differ significantly across the groups, some useful trends could be noticed. Finally, based on these results important implications for policy making and future research were drawn. | en_US |
