Humans of RMIT: Dr Anh Thu Nguyen

Dr Anh Thu Nguyen – lecturer, course coordinator, Digital Marketing, RMIT Vietnam

My main research interest is in sustainable consumption but the more I learn about sustainable consumption the more interested I become in environmental and sustainability education, which will be a strong focus of my research next year.

I have been interested in sustainability for a very long time now. When I did my PhD at RMIT in Melbourne my research looked at the internal psychological and external social factors that influence consumers’ green purchases and eco friendly packaged products. It is an area that continues to interest me and I am currently doing some research that looks at plastic pollution, largely driven by plastic packaging, along the coastal region of Vietnam and I hope it will have some impact on how we can develop sustainable tourism here in Vietnam.

I feel I am now ready to expand my research focus beyond sustainable consumption and start looking at environment and sustainability education, because my research has shown time and again that awareness and information are the key factors that impact on consumers’ commitment and motivation to reduce environmental problems in their local living conditions.

So, I really want to look at ‘well, how can we use education to combat these problems we are seeing when it comes to the environment and sustainable consumption?’ I want to look at curriculum development and how we develop sustainability into the school curriculum and educate younger generations about sustainability, because I think education is the key to getting to the root of the problem. For people to be committed to sustainable consumption they must first understand the environmental and sustainable issues that confront us.

I think I can also bring my knowledge and experience in teaching and teaching innovation to sustainability education and making that connection between research and practice, not just here in Vietnam, but also in Europe.