From Cosmetics to Conservation: How Ava Li Studies What Makes People Act

As Ava Li waited for her makeup to be packed into the paper bag she had deliberately paid extra for, she began to question the purchase she had just made.

Choosing the paper bag felt like an environmentally responsible decision. Yet the cosmetics being placed inside it were not necessarily sustainable.

The contradiction was hard to brush off. Although Ava had consciously tried to make an environmentally responsible choice, her purchase revealed a more complicated reality. “I realised that making one sustainable choice did not necessarily make the entire purchase sustainable,” she says.

This moment left the 16-year-old student with a question that would shape both her research and environmental work: if people genuinely care about sustainability, why do their everyday decisions so often suggest otherwise?

She began exploring that gap through a literature review on consumer behaviour towards sustainable cosmetic products. It brought together two of her interests that, at first glance, seemed completely unrelated: economics and makeup.

As Ava delved deeper, her review identified a recurring divide between consumers’ positive attitudes towards sustainability and their willingness to buy sustainable products. The studies she examined suggested that price, perceived quality, performance and trust continued to shape purchasing decisions, even among consumers who expressed concern about sustainability.

Ava’s review found that some consumers were willing to pay more when the price difference was manageable, while others hesitated if a sustainable alternative seemed more expensive or less effective than a conventional product they already trusted. Her review also suggested that shoppers could struggle to distinguish genuine environmental efforts from vague or exaggerated marketing claims.

The review revealed another limitation within the existing research. Most studies focused primarily on women, while only one examined male consumers specifically. For Ava, this raised a wider question about whose behaviour was being studied and whose remained overlooked.

Her paper ultimately became about more than makeup. It showed Ava that ordinary products and everyday habits could become meaningful subjects of academic research. More importantly, her review suggested that environmental awareness does not always translate into a willingness to buy, especially when consumers face higher prices, concerns about product performance and uncertainty over which sustainability claims they can trust.

That belief led Ava to create EcoPulse, a youth-led biodiversity platform. While her research explores why people do not always act on what they value, EcoPulse focuses on turning environmental awareness into practical action for young people.

The idea was partly inspired by Ava’s experience of living between Shanghai and Singapore. Although both are highly developed cities, Ava felt that she encountered nature differently in each. Singapore’s parks and visible biodiversity made her think more deeply about how communities develop a relationship with the environment, while nature and wildlife felt less present in her own daily experience of Shanghai.

This contrast led Ava to question how education, public policy, culture and urban design shape the way people value nature. Turning that question into a youth-led initiative, however, required more than an idea. She sought guidance from environmental experts and began creating resources based on scientific evidence and real-world case studies.

EcoPulse marked its global launch at the 2026 LearningPlanet Festival, which was co-organised by UNESCO and the United Nations University. At the heart of the platform is its 11-step STEWARDSHIP framework, designed to help young people move beyond simply learning about biodiversity loss and towards advocacy, innovation and community action.

Its work follows three main strands: educational resources and youth collaboration; workshops where students identify local biodiversity challenges and develop possible solutions; and

“Heartbeat of Nature Stories,” which encourages young people to explore their relationship with nature through videos, podcasts, photography, essays and digital art.

By the end of 2026, EcoPulse aims to engage more than 500 young people in over 25 countries and publish at least 10 resources. Ava also hopes to explore how artificial intelligence could help young people understand local ecosystems and identify conservation priorities.

Her participation in the 2026 ECOSOC Youth Forum and events held during UN General Assembly Week expanded that vision. An Africa-focused discussion showed her that biodiversity protection could not be separated from jobs, livelihoods and economic development. Other sessions prompted her to consider how climate action intersects with public health, mental well-being and social inequality.

“Meaningful solutions rarely come from one discipline,” Ava says. “You have to understand the environmental problem, but also the economic pressures, the community and the people making the decisions.”

This interdisciplinary approach now shapes her ambition. Ava wants to continue studying the relationship between sustainability, consumer behaviour and business, while developing EcoPulse into a platform for youth-led learning and conservation. She sees business and technology not as solutions on their own, but as tools that can make sustainable behaviour more practical, credible and accessible.

Sustainable cosmetics and biodiversity advocacy may appear to belong to different worlds. Yet, for Ava, both are driven by the same belief: lasting environmental change depends on understanding how people actually behave.

The paper bag that first made Ava pause offered the appearance of a responsible choice. Her work since then has focused on a harder question: how can sustainable choices become more than symbolic?