Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2011, 8 567 reduce or deplete groundwater reserves and reduce the flow of streams and lakes, causing stress on ecosystems. Although 75% of the world bottled water is produced and distributed on a regional scale, trading and transporting the other 25% bottled water also raises the concern for pollution and carbon dioxide emission [6]. The price of bottled water is on average 500 to 1,000 times higher than that of tap water [6], contributing to concern for affordable access to drinking water. Limited resource populations that use bottled water for drinking are least able to afford the high cost associated with bottled water [1]. Another issue associated with increased consumption of bottled water is that it can erode public tap water revenues and the capacity of governments to provide necessary improvements in basic water infrastructure [7]. 1.2. Consumers of Bottled Water Eighty-five million bottles of water are consumed in the United States every day and more than thirty billion bottles a year [14]. The adoption of a health preventive action like drinking bottled water is suggested to be influenced by perception of risk associated with drinking water [15]. The perception of risk is also thought to be closely related to the subjective assessment of drinking water quality [11]. This suggests that perceptions of drinking water safety and beliefs about the ground and surface water quality in a local area might be explanatory factors for a decision to select bottled water over tap water. Another safety factor influencing consumer decision to select bottled water over tap water is the type of water supply system where the consumer lives. Small water systems (small town, tribal system, rural water district) [16] in the U.S. were found to have problems complying with federal/state quality standards. According to one study, due to inadequate funding and facilities, small water systems reportedly violated federal drinking water regulations more frequently than larger ones [11]. Although the number of public water consumers whose water does not meet current standards has decreased significantly over years, the task of water regulation is still challenging given both the financial limitations and increasing public concern about their drinking water [11]. Socio-economic status is also a factor affecting consumer decisions, particularly given the high cost associated with bottled water. Gender and education differences have been found to affect preference of bottled water over tap water because of their noted differences in perception of environmental risk [11,17]. Risk perception and preventive behaviors are the result of complicated social, cultural, and psychological factors as well as objective information [18]. This suggests that because of the differences in economic, social, and environmental contexts, residents of different regions might have different attitudes towards bottled water. In an earlier study, the findings showed that people in the Pacific region had more per capita consumption of bottled water than in other places of the U.S. [11]. In this article, the regional factor is examined and the popularity of bottled water is mapped across geographic regions. 2. Experimental Section 2.1. Hypotheses Prior studies of bottled water consumption have identified a variety of explanatory factors for consumption behavior. However, these factors have not been considered together in one single model.