Signage Science: What Makes A Sign Effective?
In the context of compost, food waste sorting can determine whether composting operations will succeed or fail. Waste hauling and composting agencies often use outreach signage to promote proper waste sorting behavior, so it’s important to assess signage for how effectively they can communicate these messages. The goal of this study was to understand which textual and visual elements of waste sorting signage would most effectively communicate proper sorting habits to the general public. Beginning January 2020, I interned with Cedar Grove (CG) as a Waste Diversion and Outreach Intern. My primary responsibilities at CG were distributing signage to organizations with contaminated organics containers, talking compost, and translating existing outreach documents into different languages. Additionally, for my personal research, I created and distributed an online Google survey asking respondents to rank and provide feedback on different sorting guides. A key finding of my research was that respondents preferred signage balanced with plentiful images and text, and without containing “too much” information, as it could overwhelm them. Furthermore, respondents desired more multilingualism in signage. My results show that some elements of signage are, indeed, more effective than others at communicating proper waste sorting behavior. Therefore, waste agencies should take these findings into consideration and develop a more cooperative approach to creating standardized signage, which would help the general public achieve an equal baseline understanding. Also, in order to serve all communities, more multilingualism needs to be integrated into outreach signage, which could increase participation in waste systems overall.
