Recent studies have shown that Catalonia has stagnated in municipal selective 
waste collection. In light of this information, and as part of the 12th Cross-Disciplinary Sustainability Workshop organised by the Faculty of Education, the Vice Dean of the Faculty, Dr Salvador Vidal, and students Carla Castillejo, Anna Guardiola, Andrea López, Cecilia Mena, Maria Moreo, Sara Muñoz, Georgina Riba, Beatriz Pérez and Judith Villanueva, conducted a study that explored how neuromarketing could influence the selective collection of plastic bottle caps for a humanitarian cause. 

The study titled “Neuromarketing and Sustainability” was recently published in the Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal. In order to obtain their results, the research team sent two questionnaires to students from five schools and in different academic years, with the aim of discovering whether they were aware of efforts to recycle plastic bottle caps. In addition, one of the five schools conducted their own neuromarketing campaign to reinforce bottle cap collection efforts, which involved displaying posters in the school’s main spaces. They also met with the Noelia Foundation to explain how the profits of this bottle cap collection would be invested. The results showed that in the school that conducted the campaign, the number of bottle caps collected was considerably higher than in other schools. 

 “Neuroscience Applications can be a great resource to incorporate into campaigns that aim to improve our planet’s health”, say the paper's authors. “In fact, the results show that a strong marketing campaign can help drive efforts to achieve a more sustainable planet”.