What Is Source Reduction? A Critique and Comparative Analysis of Polish and American Students

/ Source reduction is recognized as the preferred form of waste management, but its definition is ambiguous. This study proposes four underlying dimensions of the source reduction concept. Source reduction is foremost a preventive activity that reduces the number or extent of environmental impacts. Second, source reduction can prevent both resource consumption and pollution generation impacts. Third, source reduction may be viewed as both a producer and consumer activity. Lastly, it may include frugal and more efficient activities. In surveys exploring these fourdimensions, Polish and American university students evaluated whether 20 activities were examples of source reduction. The American students gave higher ratings to preventive activities over adaptive activities. The Polish students most prominently rated efficient over frugal activities. Factor analysis indicated that both samples identified a group of consumer-based resource conservation activities, with the American students recognizing a cluster of recycling activities. In a separate ranking of environmental protection priorities, the Polish students endorsed pollution prevention, whereas the American students favored both efficient and frugal resource conservation. These findings suggest that the conceptualization of source reduction varies according to contextual factors and that prevention is still an obscure environmental management theme. KEY WORDS: Source reduction; Pollution prevention; Resource conservation; Frugality; Poland