Individual Perspective

Heavy Reliance on Cleaners

In Singapore, it is common to see cleaners everywhere. They are the ones who help to clean up litter in the area, ensuring that the place maintain a certain level of cleanliness. Even with the help of these cleaners who tried their best to clean up the area, litter generated by people in Singapore is still relatively high. Ironically, such littering behaviour is due to our heavy reliance towards our cleaners. Knowing that there will be people cleaning up our mess, we don’t exactly see what is the big fuss over littering since it will be cleaned up eventually.

We tend to have the mentality that cleaners are here for a reason – to clean up our litters of course. Cleaners will not have anything to do if there is no litter around thus with such justification we made up ourselves, we don’t see the problem of littering.

---

Lack of Perceived Responsibility

The lack or failure to see our responsibilities in the littering issue is another factor as to why people in Singapore engage in littering behavior. Having no personal responsibility relates to the previous point where we rely on cleaners as we think that they are responsible for cleaning up public areas.

However, Robinson found in his study that personal responsibility is a crucial factor that predicts littering behaviour. The lack of personal responsibility causes people to be lazy hence increases the probability of them leaving their trash behind.

A survey done by NEA showed that at least 25% of youths and adults believed that cleaners are to be blamed if an area is dirty.

Furthermore, many believed that government should be responsible for the cleanliness of public areas. (See table below)

This result shows that many youth and adults in Singapore do not see public cleanliness as part of their responsibilities. Due to the redirecting of responsibilities away from themselves, the likelihood of them littering increases.

~Did you know?~

In 1988, the Ministry of Environment and Water Resources and HDB experimented the ‘No Sweeping Days’ to find out the extend of littering in various estates. Some areas such as Orchard Road and Woodlands remained clean but most neighbourhoods such as Upper Boon Keng Road and some parts of Chinatown had accumulated high amount of litter as a result.

---

Perception of Littering

Some individuals in Singapore may not perceive throwing small items such as cigarette butts, rubber bands and car coupon tabs as a form of littering. These small items are often deemed as harmless and insignificant thus they are the most commonly found litter.

It is also littering when trash is being left around a bin that is filled up. This situation is common seen in schools or areas that are more populated such as Toa Payoh and Bedok. Here are 2 photos that I have taken outside Toa Payoh MRT. The waste are thrown all around and above the bin.

People may tend to justify their actions of leaving their trash around the bin as anti-littering behaviours as the trash is placed near the bin. This form of misconception of what littering is may have caused some people to think that it is okay to leave their trash on the ground as long as it is near a bin.