People & Nature with Dr. Shannon Gowans

Hosted by UFAEC graduate student Adeyinka Ayodele, this episode features Dr. Shannon Gowans discussing plastic pollution and how the Remora app helps individuals track and reduce their use of single-use plastics. Learn how small behavior changes, combined with data-driven insights, can influence businesses, inform policy, and create meaningful environmental impact.

Dr. Shannon Gowans: https://www.eckerd.edu/biology/faculty/gowans/

Remora: https://remora.eckerd.edu/

People & Nature Symposium: https://tbep.org/people-nature-symposium/

Transcript

Adeyinka

Welcome to streaming science, the people and nature Podcast Series. I'm Adeyinka Ayodele with University of Florida's department of agricultural, education and communication. In this series, we explore how people interact with nature and the environment around them. We attended the first ever people and nature symposium at UF IFAS, Austin, Cary forest campus. We interviewed leaders, innovators and visionaries in conservation social science, and we are excited to share with you what they have to say.

Today, we are joined by Dr Shannon Gowans, who discusses plastic pollution and how the Remora APP helps individuals Track and reduce their use of single use plastic.

Shannon

Hi. My name is Shannon Gowans. I'm a Professor in marine science and biology at Ecker College in St Petersburg, Florida.

Adeyinka

Thank you. It's great privilege to have you here with us. When you hear the phrase people & nature, what does it mean to you Personally?

Shannon

There's so many different connections that I think about, but at the base of it, I think about how humans have impacted nature, and then also how nature impacts us back. So it kind of that cycle of how we're connected to nature, and that nature impacts us as well.

Adeyinka

Thank you for that response. Do you think people today feel more disconnected or more connected to nature?

Shannon

I think it really depends on the person, but overall, I think there really is a lot more disconnect from nature, because we're not interacting with nature in the same way, as directly as many of us were100 years ago. We're not collecting our own food. We're not growing our own crops. So much more, we go to the grocery store to get what we need even more so we're not even going to the grocery store anymore. We're ordering it on Amazon. So we're staring at our screens, so we're getting even further disconnected. And so many people are not able to easily get out in nature and just spend time in that green or blue space.

Adeyinka

Thank you so much. What's misconceptions about nature concern you the most?

Shannon

As a biologist, one of the things I've really come to learn is that we don't need to study the environment more in order to conserve it. The nature is really doing what it's supposed to be doing for the large extent what we need to do is we need to change what people are doing. So it led me to really lean into social science approaches, because it's human behavior that has to change if we want to actually do conservation.

Adeyinka

I'm so glad to hear that response. Why do you think this relationship matters right now, especially in the community you work with?

Shannon

So I teach at a College that is right on the ocean, and last year with the hurricanes we had, we had 13 feet of water over our campus, and we had to close our campus to students for over a month. So it's a really direct impact. As we start looking at climate change, climate change is only one of the many different impacts we have, and it really is so many different pieces we need to look back out and see what's out there and get ourselves reconnected.

Adeyinka

Talking about plastic pollution related research, what problem does plastic pollution pose in everyday life that you are  more focused on addressing?

Shannon

So I've started doing a lot of work on monitoring microplastics. So these are plastics that are smaller than your fingernail and can get so small we can't even see them without a microscope. And I look at them in Tampa Bay waters in the local area where I live, and one of the biggest problems with them is that we know they shouldn't be in the environment because they're not natural. We also know if we try to clean them up, they're so small we cannot clean them up without hurting the environment more. So the approach we've really taken is, how can our behaviors change? How can we use less plastic? Because plastic never use, never ends up in the marine environment.

Adeyinka

Yes, talking about Remora APP, what solution does the Remora app offer to help individual reduce their use of single use plastics?

Shannon

So Remora is an app that we designed out of a project based on EckerCO campus where we were trying to encourage people to use less plastic. And it started with trying to just work with students and say how much plastic to use, because once you start tracking it and you're paying attention to it, and it builds accountability. So Remora is designed like a fitness tracker or a calorie tracker, where you keep track and you record how much plastic you use and also how much plastic you refuse. And it's building that accountability. I know if I have to write it down or record it on my phone and I go to the grocery store and I don't have my bags, I'm way more likely to carry my groceries out to the car and not take those plastic bags that they're just going to give me, so it builds that accountability and helps promote that habit of saying no to plastic and trying to use less plastic day to day.

Adeyinka

I want to ask that, how can tracking individual choices through Remora supports broader change beyond personal behavior.

Shannon

So we came up building this, designing the app with a two fold purpose. One was that individual accountability, and it's great if people make changes, and I want to support that, but we make far greater changes when we can create policy level changes, but in order often to create those policy level changes or to convince businesses to change their practices, we have to give them data. So Remora, in the background, is collecting this anonymized data set that we can then mine for documenting that a people want to make these changes, people support these changes, and for a business to make these changes that will make a portion of their customer base happier, and can end up being a win, win scenario.

Adeyinka

So with the data that you just mentioned. What role can data play in influencing business practices related to plastic use?

Shannon

So if we have two restaurants that both do take out business, one of them gives to every customer, no matter whether they want it or not, single use plastic utensils. The other one doesn't give them out, and we can see that at least a fair number of their customers want to refuse that plastic. So if we can show that first business that's giving out all this plastic, that their competitor across the road is still doing fine and a saving money because they're not having to spend money on those utensils, then that helps convince them to at least try it as a pilot study so they don't have to give up the plastic utensils entirely and risk alienating customers. But what about just only giving it to the people that ask for it, or asking their customers before they put it into the bag, do you want utensils? So we again, we can create that win, win scenario where the consumer is happier because they're not getting the plastic, and the business is actually saving money, and our environment wins because we're using so much less plastic.

Adeyinka

I'm learning a lot from this interactive session. So looking ahead, what is one action individuals can take right now to reduce plastic pollution?

Shannon

What I would say is we don't need a few individuals trying to use no plastic. What we need is everybody using a little bit less plastic. So figure out what is the plastic that you could most easily say no to. It might be bringing a reusable water bottle and refilling that water bottle. It might be bringing a cup with you when you go get coffee. It might be choosing to eat a piece of fruit instead of a plastic wrapped granola bar. It's really thinking about we're using you using plastic, and what could you say no to and just starting on the process.

Adeyinka

Thank you so much. Is there any other thing you want to share with us?

Shannon

We would love to have lots more people using a Remora, and we really want to see our environment better so you can go to get remora.org and find the app.

Adeyinka

Thank you so much for joining streaming science in this conversation.

Shannon

Thank you so much for having us.

Adeyinka

Thanks for joining us today. I'm your host, Adeyinka Ayodele. We appreciate Dr Shannon Gowans for sharing her work on reduced plastic pollution through the Remora APP. To learn more about our guests and her work, as well as streaming science, Tampa Bay Estuary program and the people and nature symposium, see the link in our show notes. You can also explore more conversations like this through the streaming science on all social media platforms.