ContextualInquiry:Waste Management
From IEOR 170 Spring 2007
[edit] Target User Group
[edit] User 1
We interviewed a female college student in her fourth year at UC Berkeley. She lives in a two-bedroom apartment a few blocks from campus with one other roommate. She is currently pursuing a degree in business administration and is also interested in international policy and gourmet cooking. On campus she is a leader in a Haas-sponsored organization, Berkeley Consulting, as well as an active participant in her Indian cultural club. Both her and her roommate rarely have time to clean the apartment, and have decided to employ a system where they each take turns completing chores such as taking out the trash or washing the dishes. This system is not perfect, and many times both girls get busy and leave work unfinished. She fits the profile of a user that has the ability to recycle (her apartment complex gives access to recycling bins) and expresses a desire to recycle, but only does so when it is convenient for her to.
[edit] User 2
Also interviewed was a female college student in her last semester at UC Berkeley. She lives in a five-bedroom house located on the campus’s Southside with four other college students. She is currently an electrical engineering and computer science major who is busy in various leadership roles including being a team captain of the women’s rugby team and working part-time as a programmer. She and her housemates operate on a cooperative basis; whenever the trash-bin or recycling-bin becomes full, the last person to notice it will be responsible to take it out. The interviewee’s house is a two-story duplex and she happens to live on the second floor. When she needs to empty the recycling bin, she must walk down a set of stairs to empty the bin outside. This house has two recycling bins. One bin is located inside the kitchen adjacent to the dishwasher (approximately 10 feet away from the house’s kitchen trash receptacle). The other bin is located in the front yard of the house. Once the inside recycling bin is full, a housemate typically takes the full bin downstairs and empties it into the recycling bin outside of the house. The outside bin is later picked up for collection by the city of Berkeley while the kitchen bin is returned into the house.
[edit] User 3
Another one of our target users for contextual inquiry was a male in his fourth year at Berkley as a Civil and Environmental Engineer. He lives in a two-bedroom apartment with 2 other roommates whom he describes as very messy. Similar to a previous user, duties in the apartment are delegated based on turns, although he pointed out that generally whoever has more free time ends up doing chores like cleaning or taking out the trash. He fits the profile of a user that has limited ability to recycle (apartment complex has a small recycling bin which is usually full). Although a Civil and Environmental Engineer, he pointed out that even though he’s environmentally conscious, he will not go out of his way to recycle. He added that as a Berkley Engineering student his time is precious and much more valuable than going out of his way to help the environment. That’s something he might become more aware of later on in his life but can’t afford to do right now.
[edit] Problem and Solution Overview
The problem is that there are many college students that do not recycle. It is somewhat inaccessible and inconvenient for college students to recycle for the following reasons:
- 1. Taking out the trash is a lot more of a hassle when living in an apartment, imagine having to separate and throw out recyclables as well.
- 2. Some apartments don’t even have recycling bins
Our solution is to provide individual apartments and houses with a city issued recycling bin that would promote recycling and hopefully form habits of recycling. Although it will be difficult to address issue #2 above, our goal is to help users see recyclables as recyclables rather than as trash. Hopefully in this way, they will eventually learn to throw recyclable materials into the appropriate bins whether inside or outside of their dwellings.
[edit] Contextual Inquiry – Interview Descriptions
[edit] User 1
During the interview, she showed us how they separate the trash and recyclables in their apartment. They place their recyclable material on the shelf above their sink, which causes the area to be extremely cluttered. She transfers the bottles, boxes, and cans into a brown paper bag, which she will later carry down with the rest of her trash. While she does make an effort to recycle, the trashcan in her room was filled with old copies of “The Daily Californian”. She commented that she only recycled when she remembered to or when things wouldn’t fit in the trash can. She then attempted to carry all the trash and recyclable material bags to the garage where the apartment trash bins are located. She was unable to carry everything down and was forced to leave the bottles and cans behind. Once we reached the garage, we noticed that nothing was clearly marked to indicate where things should be placed. The interviewee told us that she places the trash in the large bins and then the recyclable bags on the floor near it. She does not know if it all goes in the right place, but assumes that someone else will figure it out. We further inspected the area and found that cardboard had to be separated from the rest of the recyclables. She had never noticed this, and had always kept everything together, which probably caused problems for both parties. At the end of the interview it was apparent that she would be willing to recycle if it was easier to separate her items as well as transport them down to the garage.
[edit] User 2
During this particular interview, the interviewee proceeded to show us how her house recycles various materials including bottles, plastics, cardboard, and aluminum cans. Since the kitchen counter is quite small, the housemates typically try to squeeze all their recyclable material into the recycle bin. If it overflows, the material is usually placed on the kitchen floor until the recycling bin is emptied into the recycling bin outside the house. She squeezes boxes, aluminum cans, and newspaper into the bin, picks up the entire recycling bin, and proceeds to walk down the stairs of her house to the recycling bin outside. The stairs inside her house wind around a corner and so she must be careful while carrying the recycling bin. On her way down, it was noticed that she had to bend over to set the recycling bin down, unlock the front door, and then pick up the recycling bin again to exit her home. Her house has yet another small set of stairs leading to her front yard so she must again take caution when carrying the recycling bin outside.
Once outside, our interviewee approaches the second recycling bin and merely dumps the contents from her bin into it. She does not make any attempt to sort the material although she states it would be convenient to have them sorted. The interviewee then returned the emptied recycling bin back into the kitchen. She told us that sometimes, in the event of large house parties, the indoor recycling bin would become filthy and she would need to rinse the indoor bin prior to returning inside the house. She also states that if the bins had wheels (adding improved mobility rather than picking up the bin) she would be more inclined to recycle even more. There are some days, she says, that she throws out an empty bottle into the trash can because the recycling bin is full and she does not wish to carry an entire bin downstairs.
[edit] User 3
We chose to begin the contextual interview with this user as he began preparations for dinner as we felt this would be a good time to understand the process of how trash is disposed. He told me that he cooks dinner as oppose to eating out not only to save money but because he enjoys doing it. During the interview he chose to make spaghetti and as I watched him cut up vegetables I noticed he was throwing trash into a trashcan hidden behind a kitchen cabinet underneath the sink even though there was a larger one less than ten feet away. When I asked him why he was doing this he said that trash from food generally creates smells in the apartment so they usually dispose of food waste underneath the sink because the cabinet door is closed and keeps the rest of the apartment from smelling.
After cooking and eating, I still hadn’t asked him where he and his roommate dispose of their recyclables as I noted that there was paper in their kitchen/room trashcans but not plastic or aluminum soda bottles. I watched him finish his 16oz plastic soda bottle after dinner and walk to their balcony where I followed. He showed me a large plastic bag full plastic soda bottles and plastic milk bottles (1 gallon) and another large plastic bag with aluminum cans which they kept on their balcony. I told him how I had seen newspapers in their kitchen trash can and asked him why he chose to separate bottles and cans from their regular trash but not recycle newspapers. He replied that they weren’t even trying to recycle the bottles or cans but only separated them because they were bulky and would take up way too much space in the kitchen trashcan whereas a paper could be folded and disposed of easily without taking up too much volume (space) inside the trashcan. This made sense to me as I do the same thing because this kind of recyclable trash takes up way too much space. I also asked him why they kept this outside, to which he replied that they didn’t want it taking up space in their already crowded apartment and so they left it on the balcony and when the bags filled up they took them downstairs and if the recycling bin was full they’d just leave the bags near it or throw it away. He also said that leaving these bags full of recyclables in plain view of guests wouldn’t make the place look good.
I also noticed him disposing the glass bottle from the spaghetti sauce into the trash when he was cooking earlier and when I asked him after his meal why he didn’t throw it away with the other recyclables part of his response was; “…the bottle was small enough that it didn’t take up a lot of space and he said what’s the point of recycling it when the recycle bin downstairs is usually full and glass gets separated from the rest of the trash at garbage-dumps and land-fills anyways because of it greater value over other forms of trash so it still gets recycled” (he said he’d read about this in one of his civil and environmental engineering classes). Upon nearing conclusion of our contextual interview, I told him what I had noted; 1) how the smell of certain trash had him keeping it concealed in a cabinet to keep the rest of the apartment from smelling; 2) how bulky trash which was difficult to make smaller was separated from normal trash whether it was recyclable or not; 3) how bulky trash was kept outside as opposed to in the apartment as it would take up the already limited space in the kitchen and wouldn’t look good to guests; 4) how he disposes recyclable trash with other non-recyclable trash if it is small enough. I asked him if he’d be willing to recycle trash if it could be separated and compartmentalized in a trashcan to which he replied that he might consider it as long as the trashcan didn’t take up a lot of space in the kitchen and was easy for him to move and dispose the trash. It is also important to note that although we haven’t added it to our design as of right now, it would be a good idea to discuss a way to cover the top of the trashcan to keep smell from escaping if at all feasible.
[edit] Task Analysis Questions
[edit] Analysis Question 1: Who is going to use the system?
- Familiar users want to depend on prior knowledge/experience to accomplish task.
- Typical college students (ages 18-23) living in apartments or urban houses.
- College educated and rely on common sense to perform recycling tasks.
- Value environment enough to actually care to recycle.
- Relatively in good health (young ages).
- Typically a busy college student in a hurry so trash and recycling are the least of their concerns.
[edit] Analysis Question 2: What tasks do users now perform?
- Recycling bins or paper bags used indoors. When containers get full, user takes them outside and empties them into larger recycle bin.
- Some users sort the recycling at this larger bin. Some try to sort indoors
- Optionally rinse off the indoor bin to bring back inside.
- If no recycling bin within close proximity to trash can, immediately throw away recyclable material or leave on floor.
[edit] Analysis Question 3: What tasks are desired?
- Opening the lid that covers the entire indoor recycling bin
- Sorting items up to the most difficult combination of trash mixed with various recyclables while still indoors.
- Dispose of the trash by taking the entire recycling bin outside.
- Dispose of the trash by taking just the lining bag outside
- Easily roll the bin around without much bending over or lifting or having to set it down.
[edit] Analysis Question 4: How are tasks learned?
- By example. Other housemates recycle and simple observation teaches one how to recycle.
- General knowledge of taking out regular trash can be applied to taking out recyclables.
[edit] Analysis Question 5: Where are the tasks performed?
- Multiple storey apartments or houses.
- Stored in kitchens
- Transported through the user’s residence, out the door, down stairs (or elevator), and outside the building by dumpster area.
- Going down stairs or opening doors can be difficult or dangerous while carrying awkward bins.
- Other people living in the complex may be walking by.
[edit] Analysis Question 6: What is the relationship between the user and data?
- Visual relationship between user and recycling bin. Bin color or symbols indicate that a bin is intended for recyclables.
- Frequency and time of trash pickup may affect how often users take out trash
- Outside dumpsters are possibly labeled to convey which types of recyclables should be deposited where.
[edit] Analysis Question 7: What other tools does the customer have?
- Can crushers – user could condense volume of cans.
- Trash compactors- user could condense volume of trash.
- Paper bags- user can line bins with paper bags.
- Trash bags- users can line bins with trash bags or use for reinforcement when removing another tearing trash bag.
- Elevators- users may not always have to use stairs.
[edit] Analysis Question 8: How do users communicate with each other?
- Users communicate usually by word-of-mouth inducing others to recycle.
- Landlord may move materials to the sidewalk for weekly pickup by the city.
- City communicates to the house residents when they pickup trash and recyclable goods by making loud noises with trucks.
- Residents tell each other when trash is full.
[edit] Analysis Question 9: How often are the tasks performed?
- An individual resident would have to open the lid and sort recyclables on the order of once a day.
- Bins are taken outside and emptied on the order of once a week.
- Parties occur on the order of 5 times per year. This creates a spikes is frequency of these tasks.
[edit] Analysis Question 10: What are the time constraints on the tasks?
- College students are often in a hurry and do not wish to waste much time.
[edit] Analysis Question 11: What happens when things go wrong?
- When pressed for time, users will trash an item instead of recycling it.
- Bins or bags can be dropped, leak, or make a mess.
- Overflowing of the recycling bins
[edit] Analysis of Tasks
[edit] Easy Tasks
- 1. Opening the lid that covers the entire recycling bin: Many trash bins that have lids are designed in different ways, some have to be simply lifted, while others may have a pedal to push. This will indicate whether or not the correct directions are intuitively provided to the user when opening the device.
- 2. Placing a plastic bottle in the correct section: This will enable the user to test a simple task is an essential element of the product. Additionally, it will reveal whether or not the bins have the necessary signage to force the user to correctly separate their trash.
[edit] Medium Tasks
- 1. Given a standard plastic bag with only recyclable material, the user separates the recyclables into the respective bins: Similar to the second easy task, this too will provide information about the signage on the bins. It will also help to see if there is enough room for at least a bag full of recyclable material to be placed in the bins.
- 2. Given a standard plastic bag with both trash and recyclable material, the user separates the trash from the recyclables and places the items in their respective bins: Although this is similar to the previous task, since it calls for the user to separate through the trash as well, it might depict the hesitation of those users not as inclined to recycling.
[edit] Hard Tasks
- 1. Take trash out using the bin: Since the bin will have wheels to take it to the larger bins provided by either the apartment management or house, this task will test its effectiveness. It will indicate whether there is weight capacity or any difficultly in transporting the entire device out of the apartment.
- 2. Take trash out with the bags: This task will make the user use the bags to carry out the recyclables to the larger bins. This will test the usability of the bags; how easy they are to remove and replace.
[edit] Proposed Design
[edit] Four main features
- 1. Three removable compartments that plastic grocery bags can easily line
- 2. A strap that can be used to attach the recycling bin to trash cans of various shapes and sizes.
- 3. Wheels
- 4. Retractable handle
[edit] Reason for four main features
- 1. First, having the bin be compartmentalized will allow users to not have to separate their recyclables later. Second, the fact that they are removable makes it easy to discard into the bigger bins later if they choose to bring the whole bin down to the dumpster area. Third, allowing users to line the compartments with plastic grocery bags (which most people always have lying around) gives them the option of bringing the bags down rather than the entire device. This third option would be convenient for situations when a user has to go directly to class rather than back to the apartment/house. It would also be useful for users that do not have an elevator or live on the first floor and so wheels would not be useful. (see explanation 3)
- 2. The strap gives the user an option of attaching it to the trash can so that they can take the entire device down to the dumpster. Or, the user can leave it detached in case they lack the space or simply do not want to exercise this option.
- 3. The device has wheels for easy transportation to the dumpster area if applicable.
- 4. The retractable handle is used along with the wheels for easy transportation to the dumpster area.
Our group wants our target users to be able to throw away their recyclables in any way that is most convenient to them. This design gives our users the choice of:
- 1. Attaching or detaching the bin from their trash can
- 2. Bringing down the entire device on wheels if it is. Or bringing down bags instead of the device.
[edit] Scenario 1
A user is studying in the living room and just finished her bottled water. She then decides to throw it away.
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When she walks to the kitchen where the trash can is located, she opens the lid and puts the plastic bottle in the attached recycling bin in the compartment labeled “bottles and cans”.
[edit] Scenario 2
A user is late to class but sees that the recycling bin is getting full. He knows that if he does not throw it out his roommate will get mad at him because he has failed to throw out the garbage for the past three weeks.
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He decides to remove the plastic bags from the recycling bin’s compartments and carries them down along with the trash bag itself.
[edit] Scenario 3
The user and his roommates have just woken up the next morning from the party they held at their house the night before. After a couple of hours and a lot of Aspirin, they decide it is time to start cleaning up.
As they are cleaning, the users are placing the multiple cans and bottles in the “bottles and cans” bin and trash in the trash can.
