Food Wasting 1

Food Wasting Public Service Announcement Posters

Am Basheerah Binti Alias (B1401872)

Chung Sumin (B1102805)

Dayana Afiqah Bt Din Arif (B1301366)

Maretawaty (B1301381)

Nor Faezah Bt Mat Yusoff (B1402127)

Yeow Suet Fung (B1300130)

Group 8

PSY 222

Department of Psychology

Dr. Shishimi Gentaro

Aaron
 Food Wasting 2

Food Wasting Public Service Announcement Poster

Drawing on an alarming statistical data of 15000 tonnes of food waste per day,

especially considering this huge amount of foods can feed 11 million people with three meals

per day, food wasting has become the largest components of solid waste in Malaysia since

2014 (Albakri, 2016). Approximately 20% of food waste went to uneaten, which could feed

2.2 million people daily (SWCorp, 2016 as cited in Albakri, 2016).The major cause of food

waste was due to low public awareness of consequences of food waste as Malaysia is a food

heaven which offers various types of food to consumer (Eco-Ideal Consulting, 2009). Living

in a food heaven country, Malaysian may consider surplus food as a sign of prosperity, which

in turn creating a food waste generation (Centre for Islamic Wealth Management, 2010).

Poster 1 (Save Food Honor Life)

In the first poster, there was a figure of woman throwing away her food into dustbin, as she

thinks that the food is unwanted waste, however the food thrown away is becoming

somebody else’s food as a mean to survive. We often never realized the importance of food

to someone who could not afford theirs. Some people may perceive food as a meal to enjoy,

but to someone who is in need, it is a life. Instead of having the attitude of wasting food,

people could learn to be grateful for what we have, and shows respect to others whom we

might not know of really in need of the food compared to us. As the message implies, save

food, honor life.

Gestalt Principle

Firstly, Gestalt principles of perceptual organization were applied for Poster 1, in

order to help viewers to perceive images in poster as a single concept, not just the sum of

each image (Galotti, 2013). Moreover, as following the research of Graham (2008), good

application of Gestalt principles will intensify composition of design and deliver design-

intended message better. The principle of good continuation was used in Poster 1. The figure
 Food Wasting 3

of a woman, throwing food gesture, a garbage can, and child are clearly expressed in the

poster. This is due to continuity of outline of each figure, so viewer can easily perceive those

figures as purposed object (Galotti, 2013). Although outline of each figure overlapped, but

viewers still able to perceive those figures as separated and uninterrupted object due to good

continuity (Galotti, 2013).

Poster one purposely selects simple design following the law of Prägnanz, because

human have tendency of preference to choose simplest design (Galotti, 2013). In order to be

attend by viewer, Poster one only uses simple figures of object. For example, woman in the

poster only have outline been drawn with few characteristics of female, like hair style,

bracelet, and necklace. However, viewers are still able to perceive this object as woman,

because these are the common characteristics of woman (Judd & Park, 1993). Thus, using a

simple but clear image to elicit strong message is also one of the strategy to attract viewer’s

attention on the whole idea of the poster (Galotti, 2013).

Principle of similarity was also applied in poster one. As painting all the figures in

black, viewers will think figures are in the same group apart from the background (yellow

light) and other elements (e.g. slogan) (Galotti, 2013). Thus,the contrast between the colour

of figure and background enable viewers to differentiate images of figures from background

more clearly (Galotti, 2013).

Typography

Typography is a major executional element of word-driven advertising, for example

printed flyers and internet (McCarthy & Mothersbaugh, 2002). Any form of texts are a type

of typography. It may have positive impact to perceiver such as getting them to engage with

the text displayed, then guide perceiver to understand a message and persuade them to accept

the message given (Butterick, 2010). The example of typography used was portrayed in the

current poster where a woman, child and dustbin figures were used as places to fill up the
 Food Wasting 4

text. The example of words displayed in dustbin were:food and statistic of food wasted; to

portray the amount of food wasted daily. Meanwhile the woman figure contained the words

of trash as well a gesture of not interested with the food thrown away. This figure was used to

trigger the impression of ungratefulness towards food. The child figure includes hunger,

suffer and emptiness. It was shown that the child is eating food from the garbage to convey

the impression of malnutritious and underprivileged. The child figure itself was meant to

trigger sympathy (Weinger, 2015), while the typography in it was to make us aware of the

hidden truth. The typography aimed to create awareness of food wastage produced every day,

hence changing the attitude about their food. In fact, a study has shown that typography has

the potential to significantly influence the motivation and ability to process the message in

the poster (McCarthy & Mothersbaugh, 2002).

Figure-ground theory

In addition, figure-ground theory refers to one of the basic principle of gestalt that

simplify us to recognize the object (figure) from the background (Wagemens, Kubovy,

Peterson, Elder, Palmer, Singh, & Heydt, 2012). In poster one, the figure of a woman and

young children standing near the garbage functioned as the figure and the spotlight around

them was expected to be the background. The spotlight (background) was used as a reference

for reader to directly target the salient issue (figure) that need to be aware and understood to

the importance of food choice in nowadays.

Social Identity Theory

Social identity theory was used in the first poster. Social identity theory is defined as

holding particular sense towards particular group of people which may lead to discrimination

towards the particular group (Tajfel, 1981 as cited in Burn, Aboud, & Moyles, 2000). Society

perceive women as a food waste gender, as they really concerned on their body image which

may contribute to food wasting. Furthermore, women usually responsible for cooking roles
 Food Wasting 5

and distributing food in home across the world (World Resource Institute, 2013) . Therefore,

if women lacks of knowledge on food portion control, food waste will happen from the

beginning of food preparation stage. On the other hand, a hungry and helpless child figure

was drawn besides the garbage bin as we want to elicit the negative feeling among perceiver

such as guilty for not respecting them by throwing the food that the child needed. Two

figures were having different attitudes toward food, this already formed ingroup and outgroup

identities. Therefore, according to social identity theory, perceiver will able to relate and

compare themselves into which group they belong, and associate a negative feelings towards

wasting food behavior given that they were aware of the helpless child figure.

Poster 2 (Share Food, Share Love)

Second poster portrayed the act of giving food to someone who is needed. The slogan

that was chosen was share food, share love implies the meaning of by sharing our food to

someone who is needed, we are also giving our love to them. Therefore, we drew the food

on “love” shape plate and give it to someone who needs food. In this poster, we used multiple

language to write our messages as we hope to spread a message that giving has no

boundaries, no matter where you are come from.

Gestalt Principle

In second poster, principle of similarity was applied. In the expression of receiving

hand, wounds and dirt were expressed. Also, the expression used for clothes are representing

the poorness of the receiver through dirty and worn out clothes, like using brown and gray

color (to express dust) for the clothes. On the other hand, giver’s hand is very clean. There

are no holes or damage on clothes and the color of the clothes is bright and vivid, without any

dust on it. The food and dish also were expressed very clean, using a light red color to portray

appetizing expression for food as well as drawing attention of the perceivers towards the

shape of the plate; that is in love shape to represent the act of sharing the love. These color
 Food Wasting 6

and expression used in Poster two can be divided into two types; for poor, and for rich. Due

to principle of similarity, viewer will receive this image as rich person giving the food to poor

person, while separating and categorizing figures into two parts (Galotti, 2013).

Color wheel concepts

Besides, several principles of color have been applied in the poster created. Firstly, color

wheel has become one of the major references in current poster making. Basic color wheel

refers to the twelve basic color chart that can be combined to create different effects such as

warm and cool effects (SessionCollege, 2016). Sir Isaac Newton in the year of 1666 proposed

that colors were divided into three categories: primary color (red, blue and green), secondary

color; combination of two primary colors and the tertiary colors;combination of primary and

secondary colors (Chijiiwa, 1987). Initially, cool and warm colors were used to elicit certain

emotion (refer to diagram 1). Purple (cool color) was chosen as one of the cloth color to

convey the warm act of giving to others and higher social status as it is always associated

with royalty color (Chijiiwa, 1987). In contrast, the cloth and hands of a child receiving food

was described as dull brown: used to convey a sad and wistful feeling, and was given shades

to elicit a poor environment (Chijiiwa, 1987). In addition, smaller hand size, the shades and

tones can give an impression of dirty hands and people may associate the receiving hands as a

child who needs food and sympathize with the subject.

Complimentary colors has been applied in which the colors that are opposite in the color

spectrum such as red and green (Chijiiwa, 1987) were used to highlight the text messages in

the posters. Using complimentary colors also informed the audience on which text is more

important than the others based on which color that attract their attention the most, in fact all

the text displayed have the same meaning. Chijiiwa (1987) described that people were most

likely to pay attention to red color hence the primary text in current poster was in red color

and other bright color to attract perceivers towards the text.

 Food Wasting 7

Language

Moreover, four languages were used to deliver the message in current poster. Languages

used were English, Malay, Chinese and Tamil. To demonstrate the efficiency of first and

second language in advertising, a research conducted among Dutch participants was taken to

illustrate this point. The research demonstrated that the use of English as second language

displayed for all Dutch respondent in job advertising websites was not necessarily the best

option to attract attention in some genre-specific jobs advertisement viewing pattern because

it did not changed the viewing pattern compared to the all Dutch language (the mother tongue

of the experimental location) websites (Hilberink-Schulpen, Nederstigt, Meurs, Alem, 2016).

This result might be relevant to be associated to the role of language in our poster as well.

Since the use of second language might not have an effect on attention on the viewer (in

Malaysia context, English is consider as second language), we thought that it would be better

to use the main languages in Malaysian context to get them to pay more attention on the

message. Hence, four familiar languages mentioned above were integrated in current poster

to cater to the majority of the races in Malaysia.

Script

In some circumstances, people will often organize their everyday routines in the

concept of script (Hayes, 2013). Regarding the topic of food in the first poster, two main

characters may have represented different schemas and food values according to their past

routines and knowledges. The boy who was portrayed as the poor and vulnerable children

might help the poster perceiver to view the food schema as the survival needs and as a way

for unfortunate people to sustain their lives. However, from the new perspective of another

character, food is easily accessible in nowadays life therefore, the schema that come in the

mind would be “overcook is better than insufficient” (Albakri, 2016) that resulted in the

scripts of hungry, over buying food, food craving, leftovers food and throwing food as it
 Food Wasting 8

becomes the waste material. However, a more complex scripts concept would associate to the

readers as it depends on how they process their regular events and their perceptions in

depicting the familiar people and situation from the posters (Vidgen, 2016). If the poster one

enables the viewer to connect the schema of food to the poor people, it might easier for the

viewer to understand the concept of the second poster, which is bringing the food and hope to

some of the poorest people. The design aims for people to consider the new food choice

schema and take action into a meaningful script such as storing food, stand against food

waste, sharing and distribute surplus food to the homeless and needy people.

Conclusion

In conclusion, both posters were complimenting each other in a way in which the

issue was addressed. Poster one aimed to create awareness on food wasting by confronting

the perceiver to think about their own attitudes towards food that went into waste. Besides,

the association between wasting food and respecting other’s life is also relevant in this

context. From this association, people will think twice to throw out their food and learn to be

grateful for the food, while think of others who do not able to eat or drink to survive. The

application of social identity into ingroup and outgroup in poster one was also relevant to

trigger a behavioral change among society; people conforming to each other to produce a

socially desirable outcome: that is to consume food moderately. Poster one initially aimed to

produce negative feeling about wasting food. Consequently, second poster was also designed

to create awareness on food wasting, however the way the message delivered was through a

kind act of sharing food to others. It focused more on the benefit of sharing the food to the

needy instead of throwing away the food. Hence, second poster intent to elicit a positive

affect towards food sharing attitude to counter the attitude of food wasting by focusing more

on kind act that will make people feel good about themselves; that is to do good deeds by

sharing love to others.

 Food Wasting 9

References

Albakri, D. (2016). Research shows Malaysians waste enough to feed millions daily.

Retrieved from: http://www.thestar.com.my/news/nation/2016/05/31/food-and-

money-down-the-drain-research-shows-malaysians-waste-enough-to-feed-millions

-daily/

Burn, S. M., Aboud, R., & Moyles, C. (2000). The relationship between gender social

identity and support for feminism. Sex roles, 42(11-12), 1081-1089

Centre for Islamic Wealth Management. (2010). CIWM article on food waste

management in Malaysia. Retrieved from:

http://www.academia.edu/702682/CIWM_Article_on_Food_Waste_Management_in_

Malaysia

Chijiiwa, H. (1987). Color harmony: A guide to effective color combination. Japan:

Nagaoka Shoten Inc.

Galotti, K. M. (2003). Cognitive psychology in and out of the laboratory (3rd ed.). Boston,

USA: Wadsworth Publishing.

Graham, L. (2008). Gestalt theory in interactive media design. Journal of Humanities &

Social Sciences, 2(1), 1-12.

Graham-Rowe, E. (2014). No time to waste: Applying social psychological methods and

theories to household food waste reduction. Retrieved from

http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/53562/1/Graham-Rowe%2C_Ella.pdf

Gyrup, S., & Sørensen, C. (2010). Communication for sustainable development-A case study

on recycling in Malaysia

Hayes, N. (2013). The contexts of social interaction. Principles of social psychology (pp. 1-

4). London: Huddersfield.

 Food Wasting 10

Hilberink-Schulpen, B., Nederstigt, U., Meurs, F. V., Alem, E. V. (2016). Does the use of

foreign language influence attention and genre-specific viewing pattern for job

advertisements? An eye-tracking study. Information processing and management.

doi: 10.1016/j.ipm.2016.04.007

Jaspal, R. (2009). Language and social identity: A psychosocial approach. Psych-talk, 64,

17-20. Retrieved from

https://www.academia.edu/200226/Language_and_social_identity_a_psychosocial_ap

proach

Judd, C. M., & Park, B. (1993). Definition and assessment of accuracy in social stereotypes.

Psychological review, 100(1), 109. doi: 10.1037/0033-295X.100.1.109

McCarthy, M. S., & Mothersbaugh, D. L. (2002). Effects of typographic factors in

advertising-based persuasion: A general model and initial empirical tests. Psychology

& marketing, 19 (7-8). doi: 10.1002/mar.10030

Butterick, M. (2010). Practical Typography. Rettrieved from

http://practicaltypography.com/index.html#toc

Perini, M. (2016). The academic librarian as blended professional: Reassessing and

redefining the role. Chandos Publishing.

Vidgen, H. (2016). Food literacy and food choice: A constructionist perspective. Key

concepts for health and education (pp. 103-113). New York: Routledge.

Wagemens, J., Kubovy, M., Peterson, M., Elder, J. H., Palmer, S. E., Singh, M., & Heydt, R.

V. D. (2012). A century of gestalt psychology in visual perception: Perceptual

grouping and figure-ground organization. Psychological bulletin, 138(6), 1172-1217.

doi: 10.1037/a0029333

Weinger, S. (2015). Poor children "know their place": Perception of poverty, class and public

message. The journal of sociology and social welfare, 25(2), 100-116.

 Food Wasting 11

World Resource Institute. (2013). Reducing food loss and waste. Retrieved from

http://staging.unep.org/wed/2013/docs/WRI-UNEP-Reducing-Food-Loss-and-

Waste.pdf