4.2. Smoking and Littering Behavior
Over 40% reported smoking 1–5 cigarettes a day, and 4% said they smoked 20 or more cigarettes a day (see
Table 2). We estimated that all together, our respondents smoked 55,000 cigarettes a day or 20 million a year.
Personal pocket ashtray. Smokers sometimes carry a personal pocket ashtray. We found that 49% of men and 33% of women reported they carry one “always” or “most days”. About 25% of men and 25% of women reported carrying one “occasionally”. Over 40% of women and 25% of men reported never carrying one. Race was not independent (X2 (15, n = 7358) = 71.5, p < 0.001). Black/African-American participants (46%) were more likely than White participants (40%) to carry a personal ashtray (X2 (3, n = 6461) = 32.5, p < 0.001).
Past littering behavior. A large majority (72%) reported tossing a butt to the ground at least once in their lifetime (70% females, 77% males) while 64% reported tossing a butt out a car window at least once in their lifetime (63% females, 66% males). Just over half the respondents reported tossing a butt to the ground at least once in the past month and slightly under half reported tossing one from a car window. Less than one in five reported tossing a butt in a sewer drain in the past month. Interestingly, only 60% recalled disposing of a butt properly in a trash can or a public ash tray in the past month. Pocketing butts was less popular.
Carrying a pocket ashtray was associated with lower littering behaviors. Those who never carry a pocket ashtray are almost five times more likely to have tossed a butt to the ground and 2.7 times more likely to have tossed one out a car window in the past month.
We asked respondents to report how they disposed of the most recent cigarette butt that they smoked outdoors (see
Figure 1). We distinguished between proper disposal (trash can, public ash tray, or pocketed it) and improper disposal (on the ground, out a car window, or in a sewer drain). Less than ten percent reported “other” disposal choices. A review of the “other” answers shows that they are mainly personal ashtrays, buckets, coffee cans, water bottles, and so on. We classified these as proper disposal methods. In summary, 64% of people reported disposing of their most recent butt properly, while 36% reported improper disposal. Again, people who always, or most days, carried a pocket ashtray littered less than others (
X2 (15,
n = 7276) = 157,
p < 0.001).
We found that people who smoked fewer cigarettes a day were more likely to have disposed of their last butt properly (see
Figure 2) (
X2 (60,
n = 7532) = 927.5,
p < 0.001) and the effect waned for heavier smokers. Those who smoked more than a pack a day were equally as likely to have disposed of their last butt properly as improperly.
We asked people to report, for all the cigarettes they smoked in the previous 24 h, how many butts they tossed on the ground, threw out a car window, or dropped in a sewer (i.e., disposed improperly or littered, see
Figure 3).
Our 7532 respondents reported improperly disposing of 25,380 butts in the previous 24 h, or about 46% of the daily number of cigarettes smoked. (Note that if this 24-h period was repeated daily, our 7532 respondents would litter over 9.2 million cigarette butts each year or 1230 butts a year per person). People who smoked more also reported littering more butts (
X2 (40,
n = 7532) = 1433,
p < 0.001). The rate of littering increased from 2.3 to 6 butts per day as daily consumption of cigarettes increased (see
Figure 4).
Women littered fewer butts than did men (
X2 (10,
n = 7463) = 277,
p < 0.001). The effect was found in all the smoking-rate groups (see
Figure 5).
There was no difference in littering rates with ethnicity (
X2 (10,
n = 7292) = 15.7,
p = 0.11), but compared to White participants, Black/African-American participants had higher average rates of littering cigarette butts in the past 24 h. This held true across all smoking-intensity groups (see
Figure 6).
4.3. Attitudes, Beliefs, and Behaviors
Beliefs and attitudes toward cigarette butt litter. When asked to respond to the statement, “Cigarette butts are litter”, 79% of respondents agreed while 9% disagreed and 11% had no opinion. Men were slightly more likely than women to agree that cigarette butts are litter (X2 (1, n = 6886) = 9.6, p = 0.002). There was no relationship with ethnicity (X2 (1, n = 7532) = 0.8, p = 0.36), but White participants were more likely to agree that cigarette butts are litter than Black/African-American participants (X2 (1, n = 7532) = 11.7, p < 0.001). People who smoked less were more likely to agree that butts are litter than people who smoked more (X2 (4, n = 7532) = 28.7, p < 0.001).
When asked to respond to the statement, “Seeing cigarette butts on the ground bothers me”, most (71%) agreed while only 15% disagreed. Gender differences were significant (
X2 (6,
n = 7532) = 63.9,
p < 0.001) and mixed. Men were more likely to strongly agree, agree, and somewhat disagree, while women were more likely to somewhat agree, neither agree or disagree, disagree, and strongly disagree (see
Figure 7). Race and ethnicity were related to this attitude (
X2 (6,
n = 6460) = 32.6,
p = < 0.001) and White participants were significantly more likely to agree that seeing cigarette butts on the ground bothered them than were Black/African-American participants (
X2 (1,
n = 5577) = 28.2,
p < 0.001). Hispanic participants were more likely to agree than were non-Hispanic participants (
X2 (6,
n = 7292) = 23.5,
p = 0.0014). Participants who smoked less were more likely to report being bothered by cigarette-butt litter than those who smoked more (
X2 (24,
n = 7532) = 143,
p < 0.001). Participants who carried a personal pocket ashtray were also more likely to report being bothered by seeing cigarette butts on the ground (
X2 (18,
n = 7532) = 1011,
p < 0.001).
When asked to respond to the statement, “There is nothing wrong with throwing butts on the ground”, 35.4% of respondents (n = 4216) agreed while 50.6% disagreed. Men were more likely than women to agree (X2 (6, n = 4189) = 87.4, p < 0.001). Non-Hispanic participants were more likely to agree than Hispanic participants (X2 (6, n = 4219) = 20.8, p = 0.002). Black/African-American participants were more likely than White participants to agree (X2 (6, n = 3783) = 48.7, p < 0.001). The more people smoked, the more likely they were to agree that there is nothing wrong with littering butts (X2 (24, n = 7532) = 184, p < 0.001). Based on this analysis, the person most likely to believe that there is nothing wrong with throwing butts on the ground would be a non-Hispanic Black/African-American male who is a heavy smoker.
We asked participants to respond yes or no to the statement, “Cigarette butts are biodegradable”. Replies were equally distributed across “yes”, “no”, and “don’t know”. Women were much more likely (40%) than men (30%) to correctly believe butts are not biodegradable (X2 (1, n = 6045) = 433, p < 0.001), however, more women (38%) were unsure than men (25%). Men were more certain, but also more incorrect. There were differences among the racial groups (X2 (10, n = 7358) = 1164, p < 0.001). Whites and Black/African-American participants were equally likely to believe incorrectly that butts are biodegradable, but a larger percentage of White participants (36%) than Black/African-American participants (32%) knew butts were not biodegradable. Participants who knew that butts were not biodegradable were more likely to be bothered by seeing cigarette butts on the ground (X2 (2, n = 7532) = 351, p < 0.001). People who were unsure about biodegradability were more likely to disagree with the statement that cigarette butts are litter (X2 (1, n = 1866) = 64.9, p < 0.001).
Relationship between attitudes and behavior. Attitudes and behavior were related. People who were bothered by cigarette-butt litter were much more likely to have disposed of the last butt they smoked properly (X2 (6, n = 7532) = 568, p < 0.001). They disposed of fewer butts improperly in the past 24 h than those participants who were not bothered by cigarette butts on the ground (X2 (60, n = 7532) = 927, p < 0.001). Participants bothered by cigarette butts on the ground were less likely to have tossed a butt to the ground in the past month (X2 (6, n = 7532) = 1206, p < 0.001).
People who believed (correctly) that butts are not biodegradable were less likely to have ever tossed a butt out of a car window (X2 (2, n = 7532) = 96.8, p < 0.001) or toss a butt to the ground (X2 (2, n = 7532) = 96.3, p < 0.001). Those who believe butts are not biodegradable were also more likely to have not littered a butt in the past month (X2 (2, n = 7532) = 48.1, p < 0.001). They were also more likely to have disposed of the last cigarette butt they smoked outside properly (X2 (1, n = 7532) = 102, p < 0.001).
More women (74%) than men (69%) believed that cigarette butts are harmful to the environment (X2 (1, n =6409) = 65.6, p < 0.001). Hispanic participants (74%) were slightly more likely than non-Hispanic participants (71%) to believe this, but the result was not statistically significant (X2 (1, n =7292) = 3.6, p = 0.17). The strongest support came from Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander participants (80%). They were the racial group most likely to believe that butts are harmful to the environment. Black/African Americans (69%) were the least likely to believe this. Black/African American participants were also less likely than White participants to support the statement that cigarette butts are harmful to the environment (X2 (1, n =7292) = 11.6, p = 0.003). People who reported smoking more were less likely to believe butts are harmful to the environment (X2 (1, n =6468) = 15.2, p = 0.004). Those who said they never tossed a butt on the ground were more likely to believe that butts are harmful to the environment (X2 (1, n =6468) = 80.4, p < 0.001). People who carry a personal pocket ashtray were more likely to believe that butts are harmful to the environment (X2 (3, n =6468) = 21, p < 0.001).
4.4. Logistical Regression Results
Following Rath et al. [
29], we computed odds ratios from logistic regressions on two dependent variables: did you ever dispose of a cigarette butt on the ground or out a car window (
Table 3), and did you litter a cigarette butt in the past month (
Table 4). We also repeated the analysis for two other dependent variables: how did you dispose of the last cigarette butt you smoked outdoors (
Table 5), and how many butts did you litter in the past 24 h (
Table 6). For
Table 3,
Table 4 and
Table 5, the multivariate model includes only those significant variables in bivariate analysis. Because the dependent variable in
Table 6 was continuous, we used multiple linear regression on all variables. We combined the racial categories Asian and Hawaiian or Pacific Islander (PI) to make our results directly comparable to Rath et al.
For the first dependent variable, five of the independent variables were significantly related to ever littering in the multivariate analyses. Having an attitude that cigarette butts were bothersome was the most strongly related variable. Considering butts to be litter had the second-strongest relationship.
For past-month littering behavior, eleven variables were significant in the multivariate model. Again, the strongest effect was associated with the attitude of seeing cigarette butts as bothersome, followed by the belief that cigarette butts are litter (see
Table 4).
Eight variables showed a significant relationship to how the respondent disposed of the last cigarette smoked outdoors (see
Table 5). The effects were smaller than in the previous two models, but again, being bothered by seeing cigarette butts had the strongest relationship, followed by considering butts to be litter.
Table 6 shows the results of a multiple linear regression on the variable: How many butts did you litter in the past 24 h?