The Go-Sort-Yourself System: An Experiment in Human-Waste Bin Interaction
By James Liu, Faith Mathison, Kashish Aggarwal, Muskan Bawa
Introduction
Many customers in the US eat at restaurants because it is convenient, but having to sort waste into appropriate bins can be confusing and/or annoying, which can be an inconvenience for environmentally conscious restaurant customers. Customers may find themselves unable to sort their waste correctly, or even decide against doing so entirely in the interest of time, opting to instead dump everything into the garbage. Improperly sorted waste is problematic because it can lead to wasted resources that could be utilized, destruction of ecosystems, contribute to air pollution and climate change, and become source of contamination, making it less effective or impossible to get additional value out of that batch of waste.
The Go-Sort-Yourself system uses tablets on each bin to display the specific items from restaurants that go into that bin and covers each bin with a tray to prevent waste from entering before scanning to verify its correct placement. After scanning, the system gives customers immediate feedback on whether their sorting was correct or not and allows them to fix their mistakes. Our tablet displays above each bin are customizable and easily modifiable by restaurant staff. With our design you can be confident in your sorting decisions!
User Testing
Our paper prototype consisted of paper cutouts representing waste to be sorted, three sheets of paper representing waste bins, three sheets of paper representing tablet screens to be placed above each bin, overlay sheets for the tablet screens, and a pair of tweezers to represent our mistake-fixing robot. During our tests, we asked users to perform two tasks. The first, from the perspective of a restaurant customer, was to sort two pieces of waste: a piece of pizza, and a recyclable cup with a lid that belonged in the trash. The second, from the perspective of a restaurant staff member, was to remove brown paper napkins from the compost tablet.
We identified three critical incidents in our user tests during our analysis. The first was that the user seemed unsure of how to proceed after learning that they had mis-sorted an item in our waste sorting task. While we were initially unsure as to whether this was an issue with our test or with our design, we later realized that it might be both more cost effective and more intuitive if we removed the sorting robot and had users fix their own mistakes instead, so we removed the robot and covered each bin with the trapdoor trays. Our second critical incident, a gulf of execution, was that the user attempted to remove the brown paper napkins from the compost tablet by directly interacting with the napkins icon (which did nothing in our original
prototype) rather than navigating to the settings menu. To resolve this issue, we added the ability to modify items by tapping them directly on the main screen. Our last incident was that the user didn’t realize that they had successfully removed the brown paper napkins at the end of the test–the change in button coloring on the screen was not clear enough, causing a gulf of evaluation. As a result of this, we decided to use check marks in the settings screens to communicate that an item was already on the main display screen.
Final Design
Our design supports the experience of both a customer disposing of waste and a restaurant manager updating the tablet display.
First, we support a customer’s experience of trying to dispose of waste correctly in several ways. Our tablet signs are customized to match the waste specifically used in that restaurant to provide customers with only relevant information on the signs. Our tray covers over each bin ensure that waste is not placed in the wrong bin and mistakes can be easily and hygienically fixed. The scanners and tablet display plus tablet speakers work together to give visual and audio feedback on whether sorting was correct or not, so the customer walks away knowing whether or not they made the right choice. As featured above, the customer sees a red X and here an error noise which makes them realize pizza does not go in the recycling bin.
Second, we support restaurant managers updating the tablet displays. We provide an easy way to make changes by either clicking the item or the settings icon. Tablet displays are protected from tampering by customers by a login page. It is easy to search for items by name and all items have an image with buttons for fast add or remove below the item name.
Some important changes we made from our initial prototypes to our final design include adding a tray to cover bins to prevent mistakes, which replaces a robot arm that would fix mistakes for customers in our old design. Our new design is cheaper and forces the customer to learn by fixing the mistake on their own. We also added more hints on the display status of items in the restaurant manager editing pages. We found users couldn’t tell that they had successfully added or removed an item by button color change alone, so we added a big check mark over images of added items which disappears upon removal.
Check out our digital mockup here: https://www.figma.com/file/oUTL3shtXMSFYuwhH6Q1Q5/Assignment-3d?node-id=0%3A1&t=RZdALqmpYWNoMnSz-3
Note: The “Tablets” page shows our mockup for the digital portion of our design (ie everything in the tablets). The “Trash Bins Design” page shows our design for the physical waste bins and how they interact with real world waste and the tablets.
Figma prototype of how to remove “brown paper napkins” from a tablet display as a restaurant manager: https://www.figma.com/proto/oUTL3shtXMSFYuwhH6Q1Q5/Assignment-3d?node-id=1%3A3 &scaling=scale-down&page-id=0%3A1&starting-point-node-id=1%3A3
In Conclusion
In today’s rushed world, we often find ourselves stuck with questions about which waste items belong in which bins when we’re at restaurants. This confusion has led to our community to become less sustainable with our resources, leading to greater waste. However, segregating waste before disposal allows us to repurpose some of it through recycling and compost, which reduces the amount of garbage that reaches the landfill and truly becomes waste. This sorting can sometimes be done post garbage collection, but this takes a longer time and more resources, so it is more efficient if the waste is put in the appropriate separated bins to begin with. This has led us to developing a system that consists of waste bins with trays covering them, a way to give immediate feedback to the customers, and customizable tablets above each bin for the restaurant managers. This solution will change the way customers and restaurant managers use bins at restaurants. It forces customers to not only put the waste in the correct bins, but to learn about the types of items which should go in the trash, recycling, and compost bins.
