IN DEGREE PROJECT INDUSTRIAL MANAGEMENT,SECOND CYCLE, 15 CREDITS

, STOCKHOLM SWEDEN 2021

AWARENESS OF PLASTIC RECYCLING OF GAMING E-WASTE FROM A CONSUMER PERSPECTIVE

A case study of gaming gear usage in Sweden, with a life cycle analysis

MARIO MAHER

KTH ROYAL INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGYSCHOOL OF INDUSTRIAL ENGINEERING AND MANAGEMENT

AWARENESS OF PLASTIC RECYCLING

OF GAMING E-WASTE FROM A CONSUMER PERSPECTIVE

A CASE STUDY OF GAMING GEAR USAGE IN SWEDEN, WITH A LIFE CYCLE

ANALYSIS

by

Mario Maher

Master of Science Thesis TRITA-ITM-EX2021:139 KTH Industrial Engineering and Management

Industrial Management SE-100 44 STOCKHOLM

MEDVETENHET AV PLAST

ÅTERVINNING AV SPEL E-AVFALL FRÅN ETT KONSUMENT PERSPEKTIV

EN FÄLTSTUDIE AV SPELUTRUSTNINGS ANVÄNDANDE I SVERIGE, MED EN

LIVSCYKELANALYS

av

Mario Maher

Examensarbete TRITA-ITM-EX2021:139 KTH Industriell teknik och management

Industriell ekonomi och organisation SE-100 44 STOCKHOLM

Master of Science Thesis TRITA-ITM-EX2021:139

AWARENESS OF PLASTIC RECYCLING OF GAMING E-WASTE FROM A CONSUMER PERSPECTIVE

Mario Maher

Approved

2021-06-11 Examiner

Kristina Nyström Supervisor

Johan Nordensvärd

Abstract Climate change is a rising concern worldwide. One of United Nations’ (UN) 17 sustainable development goals is Goal 12: Responsible consumption and production which states that developed countries take the lead on showing the path for substantially reducing waste generation through prevention, reduction, recycling, and reuse (UN, 2015). With the goal in mind, it is important for countries like Sweden to navigate towards a more sustainable world. This is especially relevant for fast growing industries such as gaming and esport. As gaming grows, consumption of gaming gear such as mice and keyboard increase multifold since these peripherals are consumption products with constant performance updates. The purpose with this paper is to understand gamers awareness regarding recycling and how they view sustainability and recycling options of their gaming gear, specifically gaming mice, and keyboards. This paper also aims to understand what options consumers must contribute to less e-waste. The method of choice in this paper to better understand gamers perspective has been with qualitative research and an abductive approach. The gamers who answered the survey were found in Discord communities where they varied in both age and how often they play – from hobby gamers to professional. The results, from 40 gamers in Sweden, show that gamers today do not rely much on price or sustainability factors when purchasing their gaming gear. Non-functional gaming gear is often immediately disposed of with no consideration of recycling. A proposal in this paper is for producers to improve their communication with consumers to increase consumers sustainability awareness, or an e-waste management system brought forward by Swedish initiatives similar to the system of recycling drinking bottles. In conclusion, this paper contributed to literature by setting ground for future studies of how to increase awareness to generate more sustainable conscious consumers in emerging markets. At the same time, this paper provides ideas of how businesses and producers can improve their Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) by helping to create more consumer awareness to minimize products environmental impact.

Examensarbete TRITA-ITM-EX2021:139

MEDVETENHET AV PLAST ÅTERVINNING AV SPEL E-AVFALL FRÅN ETT KONSUMENT PERSPEKTIV

Mario Maher

Godkänt

2021-06-11

Examinator

Kristina Nyström

Handledare

Johan Nordensvärd

Sammanfattning Klimatförändringar är en växande oro över hela världen. En av Förenade Nationernas (FN) 17 mål för hållbar utveckling är mål 12: Ansvarsfull konsumtion och produktion som menar att utvecklade länder bör ta ledningen för att visa vägen för att avsevärt minska avfallsproduktionen genom förebyggande, minskning, återvinning och återanvändning (UN, 2015). Med målet i åtanke är det viktigt för länder som Sverige att styra mot en mer hållbar värld. Detta är särskilt relevant för snabbt växande industrier som spel och esport. När spel växer ökar konsumtionen av spelutrustning som möss och tangentbord hastigt eftersom dessa är konsumtionsprodukter med konstanta prestandauppdateringar. Syftet med denna uppsats är att förstå hur medvetna spelare om återvinning och hur dessa ser på hållbarhets- och återvinningsalternativ för deras spelutrustning, särskilt spelmöss och tangentbord. Denna uppsats syftar också till att förstå vilka alternativ konsumenterna måste bidra med för mindre e-avfall. Metoden som valts i denna uppsats för att bättre förstå spelarnas perspektiv har varit med kvalitativ forskning och ett abduktivt synsätt. Spelarna som svarade på enkäten hittades på Discord grupper och varierade i både ålder och hur ofta de spelade – från hobby till proffs spelare. Resultatet, från 40 spelare i Sverige, visar att spelare idag inte bryr sig mycket om pris- eller hållbarhetsfaktorer när de köper spelutrustning. Icke-funktionell spelutrustning kasseras ofta omedelbart utan hänsyn till återvinning. Ett förslag i den här uppsatsen är att producenter ska förbättra sin kommunikation med konsumenter för att öka konsumternas återvinnings medvetenhet, eller ett e-avfallshanteringssystem som tagits fram av svenska initiativ likt systemet för återvinning av dricksflaskor. Avslutningsvis bidrog denna uppsats till litteratur genom att lägga grunden för framtida studier av hur man kan öka medvetenheten för att alstra hållbara medvetna konsumenter i tillväxtmarknader. Samtidigt ger denna uppsats idéer om hur företag och producenter kan förbättra sitt företags sociala ansvar genom att hjälpa till att skapa mer konsumentmedvetenhet för att minimera produkters miljöpåverkan.

TABLE OF CONTENTS 1 INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................. 1

1.1 Sustainability ................................................................................................................. 1

1.2 Background ................................................................................................................... 2

1.3 Previous research ......................................................................................................... 3

1.4 Purpose ......................................................................................................................... 3

1.5 Research question ........................................................................................................ 4

1.6 Delimitation .................................................................................................................... 4

2 FRAME OF REFERENCE ................................................................................................... 5

2.1 Consumer recycling behavior ........................................................................................ 5

2.2 Plastic recycling in Sweden ........................................................................................... 7

2.3 Electrical waste ............................................................................................................. 8

2.4 The WEEE-directive .................................................................................................... 10

3 METHOD ........................................................................................................................... 12

3.1 Research approach ..................................................................................................... 12

3.2 Survey study ................................................................................................................ 14

3.3 Data analysis ............................................................................................................... 15

3.4 Generalizability and bias ............................................................................................. 15

3.5 Limitations and ethics .................................................................................................. 16

4 RESULTS .......................................................................................................................... 17

4.1 Diagram results ........................................................................................................... 17

4.2 Text answer results ..................................................................................................... 19

5 DISCUSSION ..................................................................................................................... 22

6 CONCLUSION ................................................................................................................... 25

7 FUTURE WORK ................................................................................................................ 26

REFERENCES ..................................................................................................................... 27

APPENDIX A: CASE STUDY, DIAGRAM ............................................................................. 1

APPENDIX B: CASE STUDY, TEXT ..................................................................................... 3

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1. Circular Economy (MacArthur, 2013) ...................................................................... 1

Figure 2. Number of video gamers worldwide (Broadbandsearch, 2019) ............................... 2

Figure 3. E-waste from 2003-2019 (Avfall Sverige, 2019) ...................................................... 5

Figure 4. Recycled material in Sweden (Paulin, 2016) ........................................................... 7

Figure 5. Swedish household waste in 2019 (Avfall Sverige, 2019) ....................................... 8

Figure 6. Overview of recycling in Sweden between 1975-2019 (Avfall Sverige, 2019) ......... 9

Figure 7. Waste hierarchy (Avfall Sverige, 2019) ................................................................. 10

Figure 8. Not for disposal-figure on Electrical products ........................................................ 11

Figure 9. Abductive reasoning (Walton, 2014) ...................................................................... 12

Figure 10. Life assessment of customer purchasing and replacement process ................... 13

Figure 11. Age of gamers who answered the survey ............................................................ 17

Figure 12. Amount of time spent gaming .............................................................................. 17

Figure 13. Factors affecting purchase of gaming gear ......................................................... 18

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1 INTRODUCTION

1.1 Sustainability Climate change is a rising concern worldwide. There is a global consensus on the need to break away from current trends in all levels of society to avoid creating further implications of our changing climate. In Sweden, municipalities are analyzing and changing their systematic organizational learning to manifest local climate adaptation (Storbjörk, 2010; Teutschbein et al., 2011). More and more policymakers, along with academia and industry are talking about the Circular Economy. The concept of Circular Economy is a closed loop, see Figure 1, which the Ellen MacArthur Foundation defines as “an industrial economy that is restorative or regenerative by intention and design” (MacArthur, 2013). Geissdoerfer et al. (2017) argues on how important it is to tackle increasing climate change with loops like the Circular Economy and influence supply chains, business models, and innovation systems.

Figure 1. Circular Economy (MacArthur, 2013)

Even though climate change is a global consensus, there is still an increase in municipal solid waste (Fredholm, Gregory and Kirchain, 2008). According to a global review of waste management, in early 2000, there were 2.9 billion urban residents who generated about 0.64 kg of municipal solid waste per person per day. Ten years later, in 2010, the same number had increased to 1.2 kg per person per day (Hoornweg and Bhada-Tata, 2012). The UN set up 17 sustainable development goals for a better world by 2030. One of these goals is Goal 12: Responsible consumption and production which amongst other things states that developed countries take the lead on showing the path for substantially reducing waste generation through prevention, reduction, recycling, and reuse (UN, 2015). With these goals in mind, it is important for countries like Sweden to navigate towards a more sustainable world. This is especially relevant for fast growing industries where there are not many studies made.

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1.2 Background Gaming, whether it being console or PC gaming, has increased rapidly, and along with the increase, comes different problems that society needs to tackle. As gaming grows, consumption of gaming gear such as mice and keyboard increase multifold since these peripherals are consumption products, are not made to last forever and are constantly performance updated. At the same time, there is the dilemma of gamers always wanting to increase their gaming performance which will increase motivation to buy new and innovative products that might raise their gameplay and experience, even if it is just by a little bit. By 2021 it is estimated that there are 2.7 billion gamers around the world (Broadbandsearch, 2019). The development of the number of gamers can be seen in Figure 2. Studies have shown that Sweden is the second largest market for esport consumption in Europe (Dagens Industri, 2019). Around 350 MSEK is spent yearly on gaming in different forms in the year of 2019 (ibid).

Figure 2. Number of video gamers worldwide (Broadbandsearch, 2019)

Electrical waste (e-waste) consists of products which contain an electrical circuit, everything from a fridge and a TV to computer gaming mouse and keyboard. According to Kang and Schoenung (2004) there is 35% of plastics in an average e-waste consumer product. E-waste is a growing problem not only in the developed countries, but in Sweden as well. In 2016 there were 212,500 tons of plastic in the Swedish market. About half of which was recycled (Hinde, 2019). Today, the lifetime of gaming mice and keyboard varies depending on the build quality and how it is used. However, warranty is almost never longer than 2 years, and are in some cases 1 year for gaming gear. The warranty of gaming gear usually correlates with how often gamers replace their gaming gear where different reports suggest that some gamers change gaming gear every 2 years while other change gaming gear as often as when something newer and better is launched in the market, which is estimated to be every 6 months (Broadbandsearch, 2019; Dagens Industri, 2019).

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1.3 Previous research None of the research in chapter 2.1 Consumer recycling behavior has studied e-waste in connection to an emerging market where the number of consumers is on a heavy rise. There is also not much research done on consumers sustainability awareness, especially connected to e-waste – but, it can be said that Swedes are rather familiar with e-waste recycling according to Jurate et al. (2016) and Sviatlana et al. (2013). This paper will connect consumer recycling behavior with ways of how to improve e-waste awareness. One way improving consumer awareness is with gamification described by Huber and Hilty (2005), in which they did not connect their research to e-waste. One of the main issues with plastic recycling is the consumer knowledge to separate different plastics in an e-waste product. Today, plastic is recycled as plastics, but the fact is that different plastics differ from each other and hence have different recycling paths. This is not mentioned in the research presented by Avfall (2019) in chapter 2.2 Plastic recycling but will be discussed in this paper along with the information consumers have on the plastics in their e-waste. Collecting e-waste is a difficult task for all municipalities, where one of the main issues of e-waste recycling is consumers awareness of their recycling options. Zaman and Lehmann (2011) argues that there needs to be a change in how society tackles e-waste with changed consumer behavior. This paper will further discuss how consumer behavior influences e-waste and recycling but will also discuss how producers are not utilizing communication to increase sustainability awareness. As e-waste and recycling is multisided from both a consumer and producer perspective. The research provided by Löf (2013) along with Langlet and Mahmoudi (2011) is interesting and improves the way of how to see and handle e-waste. However, the research lacks depth in explaining further which materials e-waste consist of and how these materials could be split up. Lastly, the not for disposal-figure presented in Figure 8, is not sufficient to communicate the WEEE-directive priority list. This paper will look further into how to improve means of communication between producers and consumers, as per the WEEE-directive. All previous research along with the gaps in research mentioned above is what will build this papers foundation with the purpose of clarifying, understanding, and improving consumer awareness towards recycling e-waste, specifically within gaming.

1.4 Purpose The purpose with this paper is to understand how aware gamers are of sustainability and recycling options of their gaming gear, specifically gaming mice and keyboards. The objective of this paper is to understand if the user of the product is aware of how he or she is contributing to pollution and what he or she can do to create a more circular economy. To understand these factors further, this paper will look at how consumers of gaming mice and keyboard prioritize purchasing factors such as price, performance, and recycling. It will also be looked at how they

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dispose or recycle their current gaming gear to correlate this with this papers purpose of understanding how aware they are of recycling options. Lastly, it will briefly be investigated how much information producers give consumers on how to dispose or recycle their gaming gear. The goal with the purpose of this paper is to generate conclusions which could benefit the circular economy, the UN sustainable development goals, along with creating consumer awareness (MacArthur, 2013; UN, 2015).

1.5 Research question The research question in this paper was with the help of sustainability aspects and the background of gaming e-waste concluded to:

- How aware are users of gaming gear of plastic recycling processes and e-waste recycling?

The paper will be a case study in Sweden viewed from a consumer’s perspective. The research question was derived from the problem that was observed when looked upon in consumption of gaming gear by gamers where gaming gear in this paper is specified as PC gaming mice and keyboard. The symptom visible was stacking up unused gaming gear.

1.6 Delimitation This paper will mainly focus on the Swedish prospect of recyclability of plastic. This study can only be considered in countries where there is a system available for sorting garbage materials for consumers, hence mainly considering consumer awareness of gaming gear recycling in developed countries. The study was conducted through a qualitative approach. In this paper, information will be collected and investigated regarding literature on consumer behavior towards recycling, along with literature on plastic and e-waste recycling in Sweden. Furthermore, regulations around e-waste will be researched to then conclude the literature and findings in a discussion and conclusion. E-waste regarding an emerging market such as e-sport and gaming was not widely researched when this paper was done, specifically looking at consumables such as PC gaming mouse and keyboard which are heavily consumed and replaced. User and product manuals of the five largest gaming gear producers were looked at in this paper to understand if they contribute to consumers recycling options awareness. Only five of the largest producers were chosen whereas the two largest out of these five have a 71% combined market share (Venture Beat, 2016). The user manual research is presented in chapter 2.4 with the WEEE-directive. Due to a time limitation, a way to increase awareness of gaming gear sustainability is prioritized where a few possibilities and changes are proposed for to better handle gaming gear e-waste.

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2 FRAME OF REFERENCE

2.1 Consumer recycling behavior According to Bicchieri (2006), a social norm exists when enough individuals know that the norm exists and applies to a given situation, and enough individuals have a conditional preference to comply with the norm if their expectations are satisfied (Jurate et al., 2016). Socio-psychological factors play a role in human behavior of recycling. According to Human Recycling Behaviour (HRB), when in an environment if most of the surroundings are observed to be driven by the moral norm of recycling, it acts as a motivation for the person unaware of the norm. In other cases, if most of the surroundings are not driven or unaware of the norm, the moral person might start questioning the norm that was established (Jurate et al., 2016). However, these moral norms are not formed when being isolated, it is initially formed and activated when socially interacting. In the initial stage the shaping of this social norm is formed by the social pressure in terms of approval or disapproval from friends, family, or neighbors. This is more impactful when these social norms or HRB are highly visible (Bicchieri, 2006). To motivate HRB, raising awareness about the problem helps to activate the moral norms. This includes making people aware of the negative impact if not recycled and how this is ascribed as a personal responsibility. But, according to research in Järva, Stockholm, 64% of people in households say they always recycle electronic waste and another small percentage of 16% say they do it often whereas only 5% claim that they never recycle, while others did not answer at all. This implies that many people living in Sweden are quite aware of the recycling process and are aware of the environment (Jurate et al., 2016; Sviatlana et al., 2013). Looking further into Swede’s e-waste recycling behavior, which can be seen in Figure 3, it is learned that e-waste in general has stagnated even though consumption of electronics has increased (ibid).

Figure 3. E-waste from 2003-2019 (Avfall Sverige, 2019)

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A labeling system on products which shows sustainability differences has been proven to increase awareness of sustainability and increase the perceived differentiation between different products. Further increases in awareness enables sustainable products to sell at higher prices with increased profits (Galbreth and Ghosh, 2013). Another benefit of having a labeling system for consumers to differentiate between products, can increase government initiatives to decrease the cost of more environmentally friendly electronic products which could benefit all producers (ibid). At the same time, having more producers focusing on sustainable alternatives could lead to more innovation in the field and in the future, lower prices. All these factors have the possibility to contribute positively to a consumers sustainability awareness. Buerke et al. (2016) proposes both a societal and individual dimensions to responsible consumption. The results also show that increasing both consumer awareness and a sustainability-focused value orientation has a positive influence on responsible consumer behavior. One way to do so is for producers to promote their sustainable offers with appropriate communication activities to motivate consumers to engage in more responsible consumption. Consumer awareness is a central concept for any company trying to overcome the antagonism of profit versus responsibility. At the same time, promoting societal responsible consumption patterns could have positive effects for consumers when aligning personal well-being with options of sustainable products (ibid; Jackson, 2005). A study in Malaysia by Ibrahim et al. (2020) showed that when gamers interacted and reused recycled gaming gear products, it had no effect on performance or changed how much they enjoyed gaming. The results instead implied the gamers intention to reuse certain discarded items instead of purchasing new products. One way of approaching consumers with sustainable options is by gamification. Gamification refers to the use of design elements characteristic for games in non-game context, according to Deterding et al. (2011). The goal of gamification is to engage consumers in the process of developing their own behaviors. Hence, gamification-based solutions have great potential for engaging consumers in sustainable consumption (Huber and Hilty, 2015).

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2.2 Plastic recycling in Sweden Plastic is one of the most used components in electrical and electronic products. It has been used in almost everything from mobile phones, electronic chips to televisions, laptops, etc. The unique electrical insulating properties of plastics and their strength, stress resistance, flexibility and durability make plastics ideal materials for electronics (Kang and Schoenung, 2004). In 2016 there was 212,500 tonnes of plastic on the Swedish market, which is more than the target for year 2020, as can be seen in Figure 5 about half was recycled (Hinde, 2019). This has exceeded the target goal set by the country up to year 2020 with 17%. The goal is excluding Polyethylene terephthalate (PET), which is an exchange of plastic bottles for receiving back a small initial cost.

Figure 4. Recycled material in Sweden (Paulin, 2016)

Sweden is recycling more than the set-up targets for year 2020, as per Figure 4. Sweden is perceived having around 99% waste diversion rate (Medlock, 2016; Sheffield, 2016). With 99% waste diversion, Sweden recycles a lot of its waste and is considered a world leader in recycling waste. Out of 4.7 million tons of household waste in Sweden – 48% of the waste is used for energy production and 35% of it is recyclable materials, and less than 1% to landfill (Avfall Sverige, 2016).

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Figure 5 shows how recycled waste is used for different purposes, mainly for energy recovery.

Figure 5. Swedish household waste in 2019 (Avfall Sverige, 2019)

As Figure 5 illustrates, electronics and batteries are a small part of material recycling with 147,000 tonnes being recycled in Sweden during 2019. That equals to 14 kg/person e-waste (Avfall Sverige, 2019). Plastic however is commonly recycled and due to the high heat value, plastic can be served as a valuable fuel supplement in feedstock. One ton of plastics can replace 1.4 tons of coal in cement kilns. (National Safety Council, 1999).

2.3 Electrical waste Consumer electronics have a short lifespan, where the lifespan is decreasing because of increased equipment features and capabilities (Kang and Schoenung, 2004; Fredholm, Gregory and Kirchain, 2008). Many different products are included in the scope of e-waste. The European Union defines electrical products as something with an electric current or electromagnetic field for it to be fully functional (Fredholm, Gregory and Kirchain, 2008). Plastics are an ideal material to use in electronics because of their strength, stress resistance, flexibility, durability along with their unique electrical insulating properties. According to Kang and Schoenung (2004) it is costly and difficult to separate plastics from e-waste. E-waste recycling systems exist worldwide in many different forms where these systems offer several environmental and health benefits when processing is done responsibly. Historically, the costs of recycling most electronics have outweighed the value of the scrap materials

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recovered. The primary goal of any e-waste recycling system is to collect e-waste to divert it from landfill or inappropriate disposal and process it such that component materials are recycled. There are different collection methods for consumer e-waste. Some of these collection approaches are curbside pickup within the municipality, or to require consumers bring their e-waste to a collection point, or use retail stores as collection points, or have producers offer consumers to ship back the product. (Fredholm, Gregory and Kirchain, 2008). Most e-waste in Sweden ends up in incinerators and is burned to generate electricity and produce heating (Zaman and Lehmann, 2011). E-waste could instead be reused or appoint different recovery options, but these options are rarely sought after. Zaman and Lehmann (2011) argue that there needs to be a major change in how society manages waste, where on large factor for the recycling economy is to create a change in behavior and create educational programs to raise awareness. More consumers need to be aware of the value of their e-waste, and product manufacturers need legislation and other motivators to operate more material-efficient and less wasteful (ibid). The average collection of e-waste in the EU in the year of 2009 was 5.3 kg per person. Sweden collected 14 kg per inhabitant in 2019. This is an increase of 14 percent compared to 2018. Studies showed that smaller consumer electronics, such as computer keyboards were found in household garbage. Counting all household e-waste recycled in Sweden, with a treatment rate of 70%, the e-waste created 1,168,000 tonnes of raw material (Nordbrand, 2009; Avfall Sverige, 2019).

Figure 6. Overview of recycling in Sweden between 1975-2019 (Avfall Sverige, 2019)

E-waste falls under material recycling in Figure 6, where material recycling makes up of the second largest collected waste volume. Approximately 70% of all e-waste collected can be treated and properly recycled. In comparison, Swede’s recycle household waste which can be used for energy recovery has a treatment rate of 95% (Avfall Sverige, 2019). The WEEE directive is further presented in chapter 2.4 in this paper, which mentions producer responsibility to e-waste and a priority order of how to manage e-waste (Löf, 2013).

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2.4 The WEEE-directive E-waste is also illegally transported to less developed countries due to difficulties of recycling caused by products which require hazardous chemicals to disassemble and to manage (Ferneryd, 2018). Today, municipalities in Sweden control and monitor different businesses in how they manage their e-waste. But this is a costly job, and many municipalities lack the resources to extendedly control the illegal export of e-waste (Boman and Melander, 2017). In 2012, the WEEE-directive (Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment) was published to demand major change in development, production, and consumer behaviour if sustainable development would be within a realistic future reach (Goodship, Stevels and Huisman, 2019). A guideline with a priority order was written to control e-waste and manage, where the priority according to WEEE is seen in Figure 7 (ibid; Avfall Sverige, 2019).

Figure 7. Waste hierarchy (Avfall Sverige, 2019)

If a consumer product can be prevented from becoming e-waste, then that should be prioritized, otherwise it should be prepared for reuse etc. Lastly is disposal in landfill which should be avoidable as per Figure 7. The importance of the priority order is regarding environmental aspects. It can be necessary for some products to be excluded from the priority list shown in Figure 7 due to technical feasibility, economic viability, or environmental protections (Langlet and Mahmoudi, 2011). Producer responsibility is the core of the WEEE-directive, which means that producers are responsible for damages done by e-waste and should pay the fees to restore the e-waste damages that have been done to the environment. The producers are those who develop the electrical product. Producers could also be those who import and sell other manufacturers products within the Swedish market (ibid; Löf, 2013). An example of a reseller of consumer electronics in Sweden is Elgiganten. Producers have the responsibility of either paying an individual fee, or a collective fee according to the WEEE-directive. These fees lack structure of how e-waste is recycled and in what systems, which means that fees can vary by a lot. Having

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a collective fee for e-waste is where two or more producers use the same system of recycling but can lead to having freeriders who abuse the system which they are not paying for (Gottberg et al., 2006; Naturvårdsverket, 2009). Symbols are mandatory to use on products to indicate that the product in hand is an electrical product and cannot be thrown in the household garbage but should instead be disposed in a particular way (ibid, Löf, 2013). See Figure 8 for symbol which indicates that correct disposal is required.

Figure 8. Not for disposal-figure on Electrical products

The WEEE-directive is made to guide all European countries into reducing e-waste, but in Sweden there has already been a producer responsibility since 2001 (Löf, 2013). At the time of writing this paper, looking at the five largest gaming gear manufacturers, gaming gear user and product manuals present poor information regarding recycling where the WEEE-directive figure is available, and two out of five cases had a “contact your local municipality for correct disposal” comment. None of the gaming gear manuals had clarified which plastics or other material was being used in specific product.

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3 METHOD

3.1 Research approach As this paper is targeted to have a better understanding of human behavior in the perspective of information, a quantitative approach to literature has been chosen with an abductive approach (Dubois and Gadde, 2002; Anderson et al., 2018). The research question in this paper is “How aware are users of gaming gear of plastic recycling processes and e-waste recycling?”. The method of choice of how to answer the research question has been to ask gamers of how they treat their gaming gear today. The initial questions, presented as the diagram results in chapter 4.1, of the survey are formed to learn who the gamer is and create an understanding of their demographics. The survey proceeds to create an understanding of factors who gamers prioritize to create a foundation of how gamers view gaming gear. The text results are however where an abductive approach is used, to analyze the results, to create a further understanding of possible best outcomes. The research paradigm is done by observing and understanding gamers through their answers, thus drawing conclusions and predictions from incomplete observations (Walton, 2014). Figure 9 shows other research paradigms and reasonings, while also presenting abductive reasoning further.

Figure 9. Abductive reasoning (Walton, 2014)

To better understand what recycling options consumers are aware of, this paper will reach out to consumers to learn more about what they know regarding recycling of their gaming gear. One approach to reaching out to gaming consumers is with small surveys, which is the plan for this paper. Gaming keyboards and gaming mice are the gear that is most important for gamers in Sweden, hence it is viable to only look at these two segments (Dagens Industri, 2019). The method of choice to better understand gamers and consumers perspective is to ask them about their purchasing process - i.e., what factors are important for consumers when purchasing new gaming gear, i.e., keyboard and mice (Nyumba et al., 2018; Wilkinson, 1998).

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The method of choice to observe and understand gamers is an of when gamers purchase their product to end of life of the gaming product. The goal is to understand gamers perception and how they utilize gaming gear by establishing how gamers respond to certain issues presented in the survey (Nyumba et al., 2018). See Figure 10 to learn what this paper will assess in regard to why a consumer purchases a product to the actions taken when the product is at its end of life.

Figure 10. Life assessment of customer purchasing and replacement process

Figure 10 has been designed for the purpose of this paper, where product indicates gaming mice and keyboard. By analyzing Why a customer buys a product with the factors mentioned in Figure 10 it can be made easier to understand how to create more awareness and differentiate which factors are more important and which are less important leading up to a purchase (Nyumba, 2018). Comparing the factors which affect a purchase will give a glimpse of how consumers reason and determine how aware consumers are of their purchasing options. Second, it is also of importance to understand the timeframe between a purchase and when the consumer wants to replace their product with a newer or better one. Better being subjective in this case. It will also be of interest to understand if consumers would appreciate more recyclable options provided with producers, such as the buyback option stated in Figure 10 by Product end of life (Gottberg et al., 2006; Naturvårdsverket, 2009). The buyback option is presented further in chapter 7. Conclusions. The method to analyze the factors mentioned above is with small and direct surveys along with small interviews with gamers in Sweden.

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3.2 Survey study Case study target groups are frequently used as a qualitative approach to gain in-depth understanding of social issues as in this case, the issue of recycling gaming gear (Fowler Jr, 2013; Nyumba et al., 2018). The questions towards gamers in Sweden are formed and asked in a way to understand how aware consumers are regarding recycling. The survey will identify age and how much these gamers spend playing, to then understand their motives leading up to a purchase of a gaming mouse or keyboard. These gamers have been accessed through Discord which is a communication software mostly used by gamers with open local gaming communities (Swedish CS:GO channels for example). However, type of game being played is not relevant for this study. The study in this paper reached out to approximately 100 gamers, while 40 answered the survey with sufficient information to understand and observe. The recycling information available consumers can vary depending on different factors, one factor being different producers of gaming gear present different information in user manuals. The producers in this case are not only the manufacturer - the one who has designed and manufactured the product, but also the resellers as according to the research paper by Gottberg et al. (2006) and Naturvårdsverket (2009). The gaming gear products which will be analyzed are gaming keyboard and mouse. The analysis will be done by comparing the factors which lead to a purchase of any gaming gear. See Figure 10 of how this paper assumes a life cycle looks for consumers when deciding to purchase new gaming gear towards product end-of-life. See Appendix A and B for the survey and text questions which are provided to the target group. The questions in the survey are as previously mentioned written to understand:

1) Gamers demographics, how old are the gamers answering the survey? 2) How often do these gamers play? Number of hours per week. 3) What factors do gamers look at today ahead of a purchase? What factors are

important and what factors are gamers aware of? The first three questions above are formed where the first two questions were deemed most important to understand who is answering the survey while the third question is formed to create a foundation of options of which factors gamers prioritize. These factors can allow us to understand a priority order of their decision making. The results of these three questions are presented in chapter 4.1 Diagram results. The results are presented quantitively and can hence be seen as with a quantitative approach, but however they are not to be seen as the core of this paper. Next, follows the text questions where an abductive approach is taken.

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The questions in the survey continue to understand gamers perspective on recycling by asking: 4) What is the first resort gamers take with their used gaming gear? This question

assumes that the gaming gear is functional. 5) What are the resort gamers take when their gaming gear is non-functional? Does it

differ from when the gaming gear is non-functional? 6) Blatant question of what they wish to see regarding recycling gaming gear. Do they

even think there are improvements to be made to recycling gaming gear? If there are improvements, what could these improvements be in the eyes of gamers?

The second segment of the question, with the three last questions, are formed where gamers are freely asked to input their point of view with their own actions in how they handle gaming gear. The results of these questions are presented in chapter 4.2 Text answer results and are viewed with an abductive approach. These questions are also what consists of most of this paper’s discussion and conclusions. The reason for that is most likely due to the honesty and valuable insight gamers provided since they were free text and non-mandatory to answer (Dubois and Gadde, 2002; Anderson et al., 2018).

3.3 Data analysis Consumers in surveys will be asked to rank the factors between 1-5 (one to five) where 1 being a factor consumer do not even consider, while 5 is a crucial and important aspect which heavily affects the purchasing decision. There is of course risk for subjectivity in this case, therefore it is important that the questions are easy to iterate to create a common understanding throughout. Since the data available in this paper is rather small it is difficult to measure and evaluate, an abductive approach to observe and analyze is therefore better suited for the goal of this paper (Brandt, 1998). The questions in the survey are firstly analyzed statistically as presented in chapter 4.1 Diagram results. The second segment of the survey, which is presented in chapter 4.2 Text answer results, is analyzed by grouping the most common words and phrases into unified answers. The results from both the diagram and text questions are cross tabulated to better create predictions and observations (Nyumba et al., 2018). Lastly, a discussion is performed of the data where then a conclusion is conducted and presented to summarize this paper.

3.4 Generalizability and bias Generalizability of data collected online can be difficult to apply to a wider audience (Sax et al., 2003). As mentioned in the research approach provided above, not many factors are considered which will create more dense and similar responses. The range between the results can thus be easier generalized among gaming consumers in Sweden. To avoid bias, the questions in the study are formulated in an objective manner while asking for the target groups ideas and observations. The analysis of the answers will be done

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objectively by primarily looking at the free text answers for original concepts and actions towards a more sustainable approach of consuming gaming gear. The bias problem though, can be that the answers received are from a specific demographic with similar opinions whereas gamers with different opinions would not have the possibility to answer the survey (Fowler Jr, 2013; Sax et al., 2003).

3.5 Limitations and ethics The scope of the case study was limited to understand how gamers deal and handle their used and non-functional gaming gear, as well to understand their preferences when purchasing new gaming gear. Limitations were also made to the demographic of the gamers since the gamers were only approached to on Discord. All gamers who answered the study were informed in advance of the purpose of the study. No unnecessary information, such as e-mail addresses, were collected from the gamers. Answering the study was entirely optional and none of the text questions were mandatory. By not having mandatory text question and demanding for answers it allowed for the received answers to be high quality and elaborated with valuable information (Wilkinson, 1998; Woodside and Wilson, 2003).

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4 RESULTS

4.1 Diagram results A survey was created and conducted with 40 answers from gamers with different levels of ambitions, in Sweden. The survey provided insights in how gamers deal with their gaming gear while also understanding the age and time spent gaming of the gamers who answered the survey. The first question in the survey was regarding age. The age ranges can be seen in Figure 11.

Figure 11. Age of gamers who answered the survey

By the answers in Figure 11 it is noted that 25 of 40 gamers are in the age group between 16 and 24 years old. The survey continued by asking how often these gamers play a week. With predetermined intervals gamers are on different dedication levels shown in Figure 12.

Figure 12. Amount of time spent gaming

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Figure 12 shows that the amount of time spent gaming varies a lot from 5 to more than 30 hours a week. This tells us that our gamers who are answering the survey are a range between hobby gamers to more serious and professional gamers. The fact that they are gamers of different levels gives a more diverse and perhaps correct depiction of gamers preferences when buying gaming gear, in Sweden. It was also learned from the survey and Figure 12, that gamers who spent more time gaming were more obsessed with performance as a purchase alternative, which is presented in Figure 13, and less conscious about price. However, sustainability was equally regarded amongst all gamers in the survey. Next, gamers had to answer about what factors they would consider ahead of a gaming gear purchase where the answers are shown in Figure 13.

Figure 13. Factors affecting purchase of gaming gear

Figure 13 shows us divided answers in the factor of price where most are unconcerned about price (voted 3 which is in the middle ground). Then, there is a majority leaning towards caring about price, but also a large share not caring about price. By far, most important factors when purchasing a gaming mouse or keyboard is performance of the electronics inside the gear which gamers are purchasing along with material on cable and miscellaneous materials such as keyboard buttons, scroll wheel material on a gaming mouse and other various external materials. Looking at the factors depicting more environmentally friendly options of gaming gear, they are not as big of concerns or factors ahead of a gaming gear purchase. Majority of the answers are leaning to a clear “Not important” factor of recycled plastics or recycling options at products end-of-life.

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4.2 Text answer results In the survey, there were three questions stated where the gamers who answered had an option to input free text in any length they wanted. These questions were formed in such a way to avoid creating bias while trying to avoid receiving yes/no polar answers and instead widening the spectrum of answers. The answers presented as results here are paired with similar answers where the number of answers is presented in a parenthesis next to the answer. The tables are sorted by the most popular answer at the top. NOTICE: Some single answers submitted by gamers had multiple options of what they would do, these were instead split and viewed as separate answers. The first question shown in Table 1 was stated to understand what gamers do with their functional gaming gear when they purchase new gaming gear. The first question received 38 out of 40 answers.

Table 1. Question #1: What would you do with your gaming mouse / keyboard today if you buy new gear?

QUESTION #1: What would you do with your gaming mouse / keyboard today if you buy new gear?

Store the gaming gear somewhere (19 similar answers)

Sell the gaming gear or give it away (13)

Throw the keyboard or mouse away (6)

Would not buy new if old gaming gear is still working (5) The results from Table 1 give us an indication that most gamers store their gaming gear at home until they might be used again later in the future. The purpose of this would be to have a backup mouse or keyboard. Other gamers consumed a lot of gaming gear where they felt that selling them after use would be most viable. Some gamers would properly discard their gaming gear as per availability in their municipality. Lastly, a few would not purchase new gaming gear if their old gaming gear were still functional as they could not see a need for this. Looking at the individual answers in Table 1 most of those who answered presented that they would not purchase new gaming gear while still having functional gaming gear, which showed to be the gamers with lesser active hours played on average.

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The second question was like the first question, but now instead asked what these gamers would do with their gaming gear if it was non-functional, i.e., what has been defined as product end-of-life earlier in this paper. The second question is presented in Table 2 and received 32 out of 40 answers.

Table 2. Question #2: What would you do with your gaming mouse / keyboard today if they became non-functional?

QUESTION #2: What would you do with your gaming mouse / keyboard today if they became non-functional?

Throw the keyboard or mouse away (20 similar answers)

Store the gaming gear somewhere (7)

Try to recycle the gaming gear (6)

Reuse potentially functional parts after opening the gaming gear (4) The answers from question #2 which are presented in Table 2 have a single majority of gamers who would throw their used and non-functional gaming gear in bulky waste junkyards. However, there is a large share of gamers who would either recycle their gaming gear or try to reuse potentially functional parts. There is also a large share who would store the gaming gear at home even though it is non-functional. The third question was stated to understand what options gamers would like to see if they would go about to have more environmentally friendly gaming gear. The third question is presented in Table 3 and received 31 out of 40 answers. Table 3. Question #3: How would you want to make future gaming mice / keyboards more sustainable

and environmentally friendly?

QUESTION #3: How would you want to make future gaming mice / keyboards more sustainable and environmentally friendly?

I do not care or do not have a clue (11 similar answers)

Gaming gear built with recycled materials (9)

Gaming gear with parts that are easily replaceable / to fix (9)

Smarter and less packaging (5)

Better e-waste management (3)

Increase longevity at raised cost to make people stop treating them as disposable (2) In Table 3, the majority wish to see better built products with contingency in mind to individual parts along with more use of recycled materials - either the product itself or the included packaging. There were also those who wanted to see better structures regarding e-waste

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management and more information on how to go about recycling used gaming gear. Eleven gamers answered that they had no idea or any clue of what actions they would want to see be taken either by producers or municipalities towards a more environmentally friendly future. Two gamers however, stated that increasing cost of gaming gear would have people spend more wisely on gaming gear while also treating products at end-of-life with more care. By the answers provided in Table 3 many gamers do not know what materials their gaming gear consists of and information from producers of how to correctly recycle the gear is not thoroughly provided.

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5 DISCUSSION The literature in this paper has been regarding the Swedish market along with information about plastic in e-waste. E-waste today is generally burned to generate electricity and produce heating, but e-waste could instead be reused or appoint different recovery options to rescue some of the material used which is rarely sought after (Zaman and Lehmann, 2011). The reasons why e-waste is difficult to handle is mostly because of the complexity of the products, the combination of different materials, along with the use of chemical dissolving methods used to separate components from each other (Avfall Sverige, 2019). All these factors create a barrier of the difficulty level of e-waste recycling, and historically it has been more beneficial to throw e-waste rather than recycle it. Historically, the costs of recycling most electronics have outweighed the value of the scrap materials recovered (Fredholm, Gregory and Kirchain, 2008). The question in this paper arose from one emerging market of gamers along with an emerging issue of e-waste. It has then been narrowed down to only look at the Swedish market along with only plastic in e-waste. The latter is a limitation which could be questioned due to how metals and electronics are larger contributors to climate change than plastic in e-waste. However, plastic is a constantly attractive subject to discuss globally, with the consensus that plastic has a huge environmental impact (Naturvårdsverket, 2009). Along with the fact that plastic has many substitutes, both non-plastic and recycled plastics, combined with the widespread user knowledge of how to recycle plastic it was more of an obvious choice why this paper would research plastic in gaming gear in Sweden. One of the purposes with this paper has been to analyze how aware consumers are of recycling options of their gaming mice and keyboards. Producers usually communicate how to recycle the gaming gear in different forms, mainly by stating it in the user manual, or by stating it on the product (Löf, 2013). A third way of communicating with the user is by stating which material the product consists of (Avfall Sverige 2019). One of these forms of communication, or all of them, leads to increased awareness for the consumer, where a lack of any of these forms of communication is first illegal (WEEE-directive to include figure on electrical products to not dispose in garbage, seen in Figure 8) but also creates confusion with the user of how to go about to recycle their e-waste and gaming gear. The figure on the product only states that disposal of the electrical product in a regular garbage can is not OK (Langlet and Mahmoudi, 2011; Löf, 2013). The figure does not mention alternatives to where the product could be disposed of and recycled. Where the product can be recycled is rather often stated in the user manual, where most gaming gear user manuals have the short comment of “contact your municipality for recycling options”, which indeed is a good alternative, but is it enough to encourage recycling? Providing information of materials in user manuals of gaming gear is vastly important as this would provide the consumer a sense of what to do after usage of the equipment and where and how to do it. For example, an estimate of the plastic content provides the consumer to an insight of how much the recycling of this material could impact the environment (Jurate et al., 2016; Avfall Sverige, 2019). This also clarifies how to recycle and handle different plastics.

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Buerke et al. (2016) argues that one way to increase consumers sustainability awareness is for producers to promote sustainable offers with appropriate communication activities. Creating consumer awareness is a central concept for all companies trying to overcome the antagonism of profit versus responsibility. With the idea of producers taking more responsibility of e-waste, with different initiatives, but primarily through communication with consumers, leads to a higher consumer awareness of sustainability. At the same time, promoting societal responsible consumption patterns could have positive effects for consumers when aligning personal well-being with options of sustainable products (Buerke et al., 2016; Jackson, 2005). Well-being in this sense being both the psychological and emotional aspect of doing good and creating a more sustainable world, while also directly contributing to less pollution. Gamification is another way to incentivize recycling and sustainability. The goal of gamification is to engage consumers in the process of developing their own behaviors. Hence, gamification-based solutions have great potential for engaging consumers in sustainable consumption (Huber and Hilty, 2015). Combining gamification with other methods of how producers communicate sustainability with their consumers, has the potential of greatly improving consumers sustainability awareness. The sample group from the surveys could have been larger and hence provided more information. The approach to have more gamers answer the survey would be to perhaps offer them an incitement, which in this case could be to allow the gamers to follow the results of the survey. Another improvement for the survey, could be to greater separate the first segment of the single selects multiple choice questions which consisted of the three initial questions, and the second segment of text question. By separating the segment of the questionnaire and analyzing the majority the answers with a pure qualitative data approach, the results could have varied. But, to have a pure qualitative approach, it would have required a larger selection of gamers who answered the survey which was not possible during the scope of this paper. From the results of the case study - the survey results along with the text answers – gamers today do not particularly care for recycling used gaming gear. The main factors affecting gaming gear purchases today is not price, recycling options or more environmentally friendly materials but instead factors such as performance (of electronics primarily) and add-on materials such as cable and scroll wheel. The factor of caring for performance was especially true and correlated to the more serious gamers who spent more time gaming. The fact that gamers may not care about recycled materials on their gaming gear or recycling options at product end-of-life may be since these gamers are not aware of these factors when looking to purchase new gaming gear. Today, as there are few to no producers providing gaming gear with recycled materials, it is easy to understand why the more environmentally friendly factors in Figure 13 are not more important than what stated, ahead of a gaming gear purchase for a gamer. Implementing

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measures towards a more sustainable gaming gear approach by producers would most likely see these factors have a significant increase in popularity and as a factor for consumers. Gamers answered that they would recycle their non-functional gaming gear as per Table 2, but since recycling gaming gear is not a common procedure today, mentioning recycling options as an answer indicates a wish or a need for more sustainable gaming gear, which is also confirmed by Table 3 of how they would wish to go about to be more environmentally friendly at the end-of-life of their used gaming mice or keyboard. Looking further at the answers from Table 3, it is noticed that most gamers do not care of how to recycle their gear, which can be due to the lack of information provided by producers regarding recycling. There was no correlation to how often gamers spent gaming and sustainability or recycling. To answer the research question in this paper “How aware are users of gaming gear of plastic recycling processes and e-waste recycling?” it is obvious that there is room for improvements from producers to increase sustainability awareness amongst gaming consumers, especially for products which have a short product life such as gaming mice and keyboard. With increased demand from consumers on performance, there should be more responsibility from producers to have a more sustainable approach in their business model (Langlet and Mahmoudi, 2011; Löf, 2013). One way of doing so is to shift the responsibility of recycling from consumer to producer by offering to purchase back used and non-functional gaming gear from consumers. This could be a strategy for producers as while they are increasing their value proposition of a product and service, they can also slightly increase price since price is far from the most important factor for gaming consumers. This approach would erase recycling boundaries and limitations from municipalities and countries, and thus extend sustainable options to less developed countries than Sweden. Another option is for Sweden to take initiatives and create better e-waste management systems, where previous cases of recycling drinking bottles is a perfect case to copy and implement. This e-waste system would most likely not only consist of gaming gear, but instead of all short-life consumer electronics which are used in everyday life (Gottberg et al., 2006; Naturvårdsverket, 2009). This paper contributed to literature by setting ground for future studies of how to increase awareness to generate more sustainable conscious consumers in emerging markets, such as esport or gaming in this case. Emerging markets often consist of a younger audience with new or improved technology being utilized, where the consumer segment also is easier to influence as they are more “open-minded” to try new things. This paper has also provided ideas of how businesses and producers can improve their CSR by helping to create more consumer awareness to minimize products environmental impact.

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6 CONCLUSION With the research question stated as “How aware are users of gaming gear of plastic recycling processes and e-waste recycling?” there are several areas of improvements of how to make gaming consumers more aware presented in this concluding chapter of the paper. Today, one needs to contact municipalities for them to handle e-waste. The information available today in gaming gear user manuals about recycling options is not sufficient to be a sustainable option for mainstream consumers as it does not provide all information needed to correctly handle e-waste and plastic recycling. There is room for improvement from producers in how they communicate to create consumer sustainability awareness (Buerke et al., 2016). Gamification is another alternative to how producers can better incentivize recycling and create more sustainable actions from consumers (Huber and Hilty, 2015). Plastics come in several categories and hence different plastics have different recycling options. Material choices are not available for consumers. This lack of communication limits the user on where the materials can be recycled and creates recycling barriers. There is at the same time widespread research on Sweden as a market, along with widespread research on plastic recycling, but there is a gap in differentiation of e-waste products. E-waste products can differ a lot and most studies do not take this into consideration. There is mandatory, controlled by regulations, figures which are stated on all electronic products sold in Sweden. These figures are however not an efficient way to communicate with users of the products. They only state the fact that electrical products cannot be thrown in a regular garbage can. Gamers today, do not rely much on price or sustainability factors when purchasing their gaming gear, but instead care more about performance of the gear they are purchasing. Gamers often change their gaming gear and upgrade to new and better when most of the time, their current gaming gear is still functional and thus their functional gaming gear either gets stored away, sold, or thrown in bulk waste junkyards which was shown by the results of this paper along with reports from Dagens Industri (2019) and Venture Beat (2016). Non-functional gaming gear is instead often immediately disposed of with no consideration of recycling. According to the WEEE-directive disposal should be the last resort to e-waste while prevention, reuse and recycling should be the first options. Gamers want to see more gaming gear being produced with recycled materials whether it being the product itself or the packaging. A proposal in this paper is for producers to incentivize consumers to recycle their gaming gear by sending it back to producers or an e-waste management system brought forward by Swedish initiatives similar to the system of recycling drinking bottles (pay upfront for it but receive cost back when you recycle).

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7 FUTURE WORK Based on the limitations, future research could be to analyze more than plastic in e-waste, and in other markets than Sweden. For example, have a look at gaming gear in the United States. Copper and other metals is a large problem in e-waste, but a much more difficult task to handle since metals are integrated with all electronics. It would also be out of value to analyze how less developed countries prioritize factors ahead of purchasing gaming gear, i.e., if cost is a larger factor than what it is in Sweden for consumers. Another aspect which would be interesting to study further would be to understand if recycled materials in gaming gear affect performance. This is since recycled plastics have less durability than virgin plastics and other effects. Also, would less durable gaming gear increase consumption instead and thus have an opposite effect on sustainability and the circular economy?

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Zaman, A. U., & Lehmann, S. (2011). Urban growth and waste management optimization towards ‘zero waste city’. City, Culture and Society, 2(4), 177-187.

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APPENDIX A: CASE STUDY, DIAGRAM

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APPENDIX B: CASE STUDY, TEXT

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