Assessment of pro-environmental awareness and washing practices towards microfiber pollution from textile laundering in India

Microfiber pollution from textile laundering has gained significant attention in the scientific community due to its widespread presence and potential toxicity. While numerous scientific studies have explored technical parameters contributing to microfiber emissions, the human dimensions of microfiber pollution are understudied. This study investigated eco-friendly washing practices, awareness and actions related to microfiber pollution from textile laundering through an online survey of 355 participants across India. A machine learning approach, specifically Gradient Boosting, was utilised to investigate the demographic determinants of eco-friendly washing practices as well as pro-environmental awareness and actions. The model has shown strong predictive performance for eco-friendly washing practices (R2 = 0.931) and pro-environmental actions (R2 = 0.984). The feature importance analysis, measuring the relative contribution of each variable to model predictions identified education level (importance score: 0.33 for washing, 0.29 for awareness), area of residence (0.28 and 0.35), and gender (0.22 and 0.25) as the most influential predictors, while age had minimal impact (0.17 and 0.11). Women reported having better eco-friendly washing practices, while men showed higher awareness and a greater willingness to act, highlighting a knowledge-action gap. 84.1% of the respondents were unaware of microfiber-filtering devices, such as the Cora Ball or Guppy Friend Bag, but 80.4% were willing to use them once informed. These data-driven insights will be useful for targeted interventions, such as curriculum reforms, awareness campaigns, incentives for microfiber filtration technologies, and amendments to extended producer responsibility guidelines and regulatory policies, thereby aligning with Sustainable Development Goal 12.