Communicating the Risks and Benefits of Human Urine-Derived Fertilizer

Alex Segrè Cohen, Nancy G. Love and Joseph Árvai
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Alex Segrè Cohen: Department of Psychology, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA 90089, USA
Nancy G. Love: Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48103, USA
Joseph Árvai: Department of Psychology, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA 90089, USA

Sustainability, 2020, vol. 12, issue 23, 1-14

Abstract: Ensuring long-term access to nutrients needed for food production is a growing global challenge. Human urine diversion and recycling is a viable and energy-efficient means of recovering nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium from wastewater. Before implementation, however, it is critical to understand how communicating differently about human urine-derived fertilizer may influence its public acceptance. This study tests how different strategies of communication (video compared to texts), as well as different amounts of information, impact public acceptance. We also explored how specific characteristics, such as age and education level, may impact the usefulness of the different strategies of communication. The results indicate that short and long videos are the most useful risk communication strategies, and age fully moderates this relationship. This research may serve as a jumping off point for future studies focused on how risk communication strategies may affect consumer acceptance of other emerging food technologies.

Keywords: risk communication; emerging technology; public acceptance; urine-diversion and reuse (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
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