Gamified Waste Bin: A New Perspective on Littering

Is waste disposal too boring? Why don’t we gamify it using our very own Gamified Waste Bin?

Written by Zareen & Zarif, Edited by Sadat & Faizan

Imagine a person sitting on a bench in a park sipping his tea in a plastic cup during the sunset. He finishes his drink, wraps the cup, and….. throws it on the ground. You might think we are kidding, right? Nope, that’s exactly what happens every day in front of our eyes in Bangladesh. Many people litter. From parks and streets to beaches and forests, people throw trash in the ground everywhere instead of using the waste bin. You can see the evidence of it in the image below, taken from our previous blog Why do people litter? Can’t they just use the bin?

Let’s recap what we’ve learned when we pondered the question: why do people litter, and how can we reduce it? After interviewing and researching, we discovered that people litter mainly because littering is a societal norm. There are no consequences if they litter, and there’s insufficient motivation and incentive to behave differently. There are other reasons, such as the lack of visible & accessible waste bins, lack of government-enforced rules, etc. This visible form of plastic pollution is not only seen on our lands but also in our water bodies, such as rivers and lakes. This is detrimental to marine animals’ health and also equally harmful to humans. Moreover, landfills from plastic pollution are the major cause of 3 – 4% of global carbon emissions.

Countries like Germany have approached the problem with the Deposit Refund Scheme (DFS), where people receive money when they deposit their plastic bottles. However, according to an article by Cyrille Cabot, it has a rebound effect that increases the consumption of recyclable plastics. So, what might be a sustainable solution to stop littering?

To tackle this global issue, we developed Gamified Waste Bin. In this game, the waste bin is the controller connected to a video game on the PC. Throwing trash into the bin is gamified to make the experience exciting and entertaining. The game is designed to promote proper trash disposal in the waste bin instead of on the ground in public spaces.

In the video game, the virtual waste bin moves from left to right & vice versa. The player has to throw the paper ball, which acts as trash, into the real-life bin (the controller) when the virtual waste bin comes in the middle. This triggers the sensor to throw the virtual trash into the virtual waste bin in the video game. Sound effects like throwing and dropping sounds with background music were added to make the game feel more immersive.

To mimic real-life littering, the game shows piles of background waste when the player misses hitting the waste bin at the right moment. If the player is successful, then there’s no background waste. Players have 3 or 5 chances to throw the trash into the bin. Black slots turn green if they’re successful and red if they’re not.

Players must hit the virtual waste bin successfully in all those chances to get the winning end screen. It gives a thankful message and background clapping sound to motivate players even more. The losing end screen shows a heap of waste which indicates how plastic pollution creates landfills. It also shows the score of how many chances the player missed. This was implemented to encourage the correct disposal of waste and make people aware of the consequences of littering and plastic pollution.

Initially, we experimented with the Sonar sensor, but it responded very slowly because of its latency. So, we opted for an IR sensor. To detect the waste, we placed the IR sensor inside the bin. The sensor is located near the top of the bin and is connected to an Arduino board. When the IR sensor detects the paper ball that acts as trash, it triggers the IR proximity sensor to pass a value to the PC through a wire. This triggers the throwing animation of the trash in the video game.

Our research aimed to find out whether an alternative game controller like our Gamified Waste Bin can motivate people to dispose of trash in the bin correctly.

We first invited random individuals to play the game as part of our play-testing process. Without any previous notice, we conducted this playtest randomly over a few days in several parks and tea stall fronts. This test was carried out using several game versions. We updated the end screens during this playtest with motivational phrases and pictures. The participants ranged from adult teenagers to middle-aged males. During this initial playtest, we could not convince any female participants. They appeared less interested in the game than we expected.

At the end of their play session, we asked about their experience with our game and tried to understand whether it encouraged them to dispose of trash correctly into the waste bin. 10 people participated in our initial playtest. All of them appreciated our game and this initiative. Their feedbacks were:

• This could be a great way to teach young children the correct waste disposal in an interactive way.
• They also expressed concerns about whether adults would be willing to try this game and thus change their behavior.
• Jahedul Hoque, a chemistry professor from Dhaka Residential Model College, said that reducing littering requires a lot of waste management structures, which are not present in Bangladesh. Waste management must transfer trash from public waste bins to storage and recycling plants. He also suggested sorting trash into biodegradable and non-biodegradable plastics, making it easier to manage recycling.
• One of them suggested increasing the speed of the moving virtual waste bin from each chance to the next. This would make the game more challenging and exciting.

After our initial playtest, we collaborated with a bakery food cart named Zakia Rannaghor, which sells pastry and bakery items. We announced the game session a day earlier with the following poster.

On the day of the playtest, we set up our game next to the food cart. As recommended by the food cart owner prior to this playtest, we also included a clapping sound. We first combined the game with food orders in an attempt to bring in potential customers. The food cart was right next to a trash can. After ordering, playing, and eating, they threw away the wrapper. We later made the game open for everyone.

This time, our playtesters were mostly young children aged 5-15, with a few adult male participants. Overall 20 people participated to try out our game that day. Our findings and observations from the playtest are as follows:

• Even though many people understood English, some faced difficulties understanding the texts from both end screens. So, they suggested that we change the texts to Bengali.
• One of the participants identified that taking out the trash/paper balls after every session of the game controller was repetitive. He suggested a pool table-type solution where balls come back to the bottom. Moreover, he asked us to build a tray from which we could retrieve all the trash together instead of manually retrieving them individually. However, considering our game’s and campaign’s spirit, this might be a very unrealistic solution in the context of real-life waste bins.
• We found that young children, regardless of gender, enjoyed our game more than adults. Their parents also appreciated our initiative to teach waste disposal in such an enjoyable manner. However, few parents showed bias against playing games and did not let their child participate.
• Learned behaviors and habits are difficult to change. This became apparent when we witnessed a child litter right in front of us despite being taught not to litter a minute earlier in the game. The child purchased a chocolate donut. She unwrapped the donut, ate it, and then…… dropped the plastic wrap on the ground even though the waste bin was just beside the food cart. We believe that people need to be repeatedly exposed to this kind of campaign to see significant changes in their behavior.
• This game was successful at improving the sales of the food cart. From our observations, the entertainment factor appeared to have impacted the attraction of more potential customers. The owner informed us that they sold more pastry items on the day of our playtest. Customers even asked for it the following day.

Yes, but this has to be integrated with other crucial factors like access to proper waste bins in public spaces, waste management & recycling infrastructure, strict enforcement, and awareness building through education. These campaigns can be conducted in places like educational institutions, beachfronts where littering is still prominent, urban streets, public markets, festivals, events, fairs, etc. If anti-littering campaigns can be turned into more active, engaging, and action-driven by utilizing these games, they can help reduce people’s littering behavior.

We think we can work to improve this in multiple ways. Such as:

• We haven’t implemented any large-scale field tests. Large-scale field tests with 100s of participants would give us a clearer picture.
• Due to technical limitations, the screen and controller might feel visually disjointed because of the keyboard in the laptop. In the future, we plan to make gamified waste bin more cohesive by integrating a dedicated display without any keyboard.
• We have already started changing the game to include the text of end screens in Bengali. We will update the game to allow customized end screens to support our testing audience.
• Even though we added a clapping sound on the end screen, we found interaction animation effects were very simple. In the near future, we will add more interactive elements to enhance the positive reinforcement mechanisms even more.
• As kids treated this just as a game instead of a social message, they were unlikely to change their behavior. A more engaging and action-driven campaign where they will collect and dispose of waste in the street would help make it more impactful.
• We will devise a solution to engage more adult women in our playtests for a more inclusive outcome.

The Gamified Waste Bin is more than just a game; it’s a tool for social change. By turning the mundane act of throwing trash into an exciting challenge, we’re shaping a cleaner, more responsible world. The solution to littering could be just one playful throw away.

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