Plastic Bag Usage in Young People

Biographies

Zhihui Hang

My name is Linda Hang and I come from China. In life, I am a green person. I often choose to go to the supermarket with a cloth bag to reduce the use of plastic bags. I pay close attention to the negative effects caused by the use of disposable plastic bags, such as Marine pollution. I hope to make a small positive change in the world by reducing the frequency of using plastic bags and spreading the concept of environmental protection to people around me.

Zhihui Hang

Jiarui Sui

Hello everyone, I’m Jessica Sui from Dalian, China. My hometown is a coastal city, I always play around the sea, but recently, there are lot of plastic garbage around there. In order to reduce the pollution, I am volunteering to pick up the garbage around the sea and appeal people to make less plastic garbage. Even though it may only make some small changes, but I think if everyone pay attention and have some move, our environment will be better.

Jiarui Sui

Abstract

To further introduce our research, the following abstract have introduced the research purpose, method and result of our study in more detail.

Objective: Young people make up the largest consumer group for plastic bags (O' Brien & Thondhlana, 2019), which poses a major threat to the environment and human health (Da Costa et al., 2016). The study aimed to determine the correlation between Vant 148 students’ disposable bag use and the severity of plastic regulations in their home countries in order to analyze a more suitable plastic use policy for young people.

Method: 105 participants (103 completers) in the UBC Vantage One Program from ten different countries filled out an online survey through a questionnaire. The questionnaire contained 11 questions, which compared answers with questions from their plastic bag usage habit from before coming to Canada and after coming to Canada. Questions about the severity of the plastic use policy in the country of origins for the participants were also included in the questionnaire. After a statistical analysis of available data, bar charts and scatter charts were used to analyze the correlation between plastic use policies and the plastic bag use habits of young people.

Results: The correlation between the severity of national plastic use policies and the plastic bag use habits of young people led to a negative result. As plastic policies become more strict, young people will use plastic bags less often.

Conclusion: In order to reduce the habit of young people using plastic bags so frequently, a relatively strict plastic use policy is necessary.

Keywords: plastic usage, national policy, plastic pollution, young people