Need to Change, Want to Change, or Hard to Change? Targeting three dinner food waste profiles with regard to attitudes and personality traits

Abstract

In 2015, the United Nations’ sustainable development sub-goal 12.3 called for halving food waste per capita by 2030. In Norway, dinner leftovers are the largest consumer food waste category, particularly in households with children. To reduce household food waste, we hypothesised that different strategies for different consumer profiles are necessary and aimed to document self-reported food waste in relation to consumers' attitudes and personalities. In a survey, 333 consumers with children reported their perceived dinner waste (PDW). In addition, we collected the respondents’ attitudes towards food waste, as well as their environmental awareness and personality traits in order to classify them into three previously identified personality-environmental awareness segments. Our results show that Need to Change consumers (30%), characterized by Emotional Control and Openness to Experience, reported the highest PDW and showed reluctance to reduce food waste, making them a key target for interventions. Want to Change consumers (54%) reported the lowest PDW and showed high motivation to reduce food waste, but a further reduction from this segment would have less societal impact. Hard to Change consumers (15%), characterized by Conscientiousness, Agreeableness, and low Openness to Experiences, reported medium PDW. Engaging this segment could have a moderate impact, but they might be harder to reach. Our findings support the idea that environmental awareness and personality traits should be taken into consideration when developing strategies to reduce household food waste. Targeted intervention recommendations to reach each profile are derived.