Like leaves on the ground: A Qualitative Study of Practices and Attitudes Towards Cigarette Filters in Gothenburg

Abstract

This work's interest is to achieve a better understanding of smoker's disposal practices, in an effort to better understand how filters delimit public space. Every year billions of cigarette filters are disposed of by smokers onto public spaces. Society regards filters as litter, but does not currently regard them in the same manner as other forms of public waste. Societal perceptions that surround littering suggest that it is immoral, and requests that its members dispose of waste responsibly. Disposed filters represent an object of translation between social worlds, as both commonly understood and yet perceived differently by individual actors. This is demonstrated by both negligent disposal practices which test the boundaries of acceptable waste within public spaces, and smokers who recognize this moral dilemma, who then adjust their smoking and disposal practices to incorporate responsible measures. In this light filters demarcate public spaces, both as identifiers of immoral actions, and as objects that determine smoking spaces, which contravenes the objective of public space. Observational data was gathered over three months using participant observation to create a general comprehension of smoker's disposal practices in public areas of Gothenburg. Four semi-structured interviews and eleven informal interviews were conducted, where informants shared their perspectives of what disposed filters mean to them when contextualized within urban and natural environments. These conversations also created an understanding of how they defined waste, and how they defined disposed cigarette filters as waste objects. Keywords: smokers, filter, disposal, public space, object, waste.