SO 100 Principles of Sociology

Doing Social Research

Garbology Activity

Over the next few days, go through the garbage collected in your home, apartment, or
dorm. The goal is for you to write up an analysis of what a stranger could deduce from
your garbage. For example – do you study much? Do you have much money to spare?
One might find the information to these questions in different forms of trash – junk food
wrappers or take out bags, bank statement or bills etc. Be sure to draw from the ideas as
well as the language from chapters 5 and 6. For example, what method is this? What are
the variables? Do you have a hypothesis? Etc.

Here are some questions you might consider answering – feel free to add more!:

 From someone’s garbage how could someone determine the following:

o People’s ages
o People’s Genders
o Social Class of occupants of the house
 What sorts of questions could not be answered by looking at someone’s garbage?
 What is the impact of recycling on garbology? What does this mean for
archeologists a thousand years from now who study our garbage?
 Over the past few days of classes and the weekend garbage accumulation occurred in

the form of yogurt containers, apple pits, tissues, floss, old razor blades, cotton swabs, Q-

tips, an old deodorant case, used highlighters, and receipts from Walmart and speedway.

From this garbage collected in my dorm room a stranger could deduce a few things about

the kind of person lives in my dorm through the qualitative study of my garbage. They

could see that I am a healthy individual from the yogurt and apple pits. They see I like to

have good hygiene from the toiletries used. They could also see my study habits by

seeing the old highlighters that were used. Also looking at receipts of groceries and gas to

see that I live far away from school and I buy healthy but not expensive snacks. With all

these qualitative findings the strangers may hypothesize that I am a college student who

lives far away from school and buys food and school supplies for studying and also that I

am a male based on the razor blade and the male deodorant.

The type of study that would be done would have a qualitative approach with an

observation method of collecting the data from the trash with the test subject not around.

This study would lead to the hypothesis of the type of person that lives in a home, dorm,

or apartment affects the garbage they produce. The variable would be the type of person

as the independent variable and the type of garbage produced as the dependent variable.

This study can also lead to other questions being asked and solved based on a persons

garbage for example, how old is the individual you could look for hearing aid batteries,

birthday cards, and etc. you could also see a person gender based on the toiletries used

and even menstrual cycle products that women use are good indicators of gender.

Another finding would be the individual’s social class, and this could be seen in the foods
they eat, bank statements, insurance statements, old appliances that are thrown away and

even they type on contacts that person throws and away after they are done wearing them.

Questions that can be answered using. Garbology is fast and easy to use and can show

you a person’s habits, ethnicity, hobbies, family, and work routine throughout their life.

However, some questions that this cannot answer are if a family went on a trip or decided

to go out to eat a night or if they watch a movie at the house as a family or alone.

The impact on recycling in garbology allows for us to learn about human culture and

the past. This especially shown in archeology and how we learn about early human

settlement and movement based on the garbage that they left after moving to a different

area or just dying from age. Garbology opens the door for use to study and learn more of

our past through scientific lenses of biology, anatomy, Sociology, and much more.