1 / 26

What news from the psychologists ?

What news from the psychologists ?. On the psychology of meat consumption Stijn Bruers. ‘Echte meisjes in de jungle’. Cognitive dissonance. Example : eating tomatoes is immoral ? Cognitive dissonance : behavior <> values

kedem
Download Presentation

What news from the psychologists ?

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. Whatnewsfrom the psychologists? On the psychology of meatconsumption Stijn Bruers

  2. ‘Echte meisjes in de jungle’

  3. Cognitivedissonance • Example: eatingtomatoes is immoral? • Cognitivedissonance: behavior <> values Festinger, L. (1957). A theory of cognitive dissonance. New York, NY: Harper & Row. • Changes in moral attitudes: the cheating experiment Mills, J. (1958). Changes in moral attitudes followingtemptation. Journal of Personality, 26(4), 517-531. • The meat paradox Bastian B., Loughnan S., Haslam N. & Radke H. (2012). Don't Mind Meat? The Denial of Mind to Animals Used for Human Consumption. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin vol. 38 no. 2 p.247-256. Loughnan S., Haslam N. & Bastian B. (2010). The role of meat consumption in the denial of moral status and mind to meat animals. Appetite 55 p.156–159. Bratanova B. Loughnan S. & Bastian B. (2011). The effect of categorization as food on the perceived moral standing of animals. Appetite 57 p.193–196

  4. Cognitivedissonance • Humanuniqueness Bilewicz M., Imhoff R. & Drogosz M. (2010). The humanity of what we eat: Conceptions of human uniqueness among vegetarians and omnivores. European Journal of Social Psychology. • Moral disengagement • Shifting/spreadingresponsibility • Rationalizations • Eufemisms • Denying /minimizingharmfulconsequences • Dehumanizingvictims Bandura, A., Barbaranelli, C., Caprara, G.V. & Pastorelli, C. (1996). Mechanisms of Moral Disengagement in the Exercise of Moral Agency. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol. 71(2), p.364-374

  5. Cognitivedissonance • Carnisticnumbing 1) People want to have a positive self-image, and consistency between values ​​and behavior is part of this. 2) A positive self-image does not allow for unnecessary violence against innocent individuals. 3) Meatproduction is a kind of unnecessaryviolence. 4) Meat consumption is a form of complicit violence (second-hand violence, in which one lets others do the dirty work). 5) Therefore meat consumption causes cognitive moral dissonance (conflict between values ​​and behavior) and is a threat to self-esteem. 6) Psychic numbing is a response to a threat to a positive self-image. 7) Carnistic numbing is used in order to reduce such dissonance. Melanie Joy (2002). Psychic numbing and meat consumption: the psychology of carnism. Dissertation, San Fransisco.

  6. Posttraumatic stress • Slaughterhousworkers: Perpetration-Induced Traumatic Stress (PITS) MacNair, R. (2002) Perpetration-Induced Traumatic Stress: The Psychological Consequences of Killing. Westport, CT: Praeger Publishers. Dillard, J. (2008) A Slaughterhouse Nightmare: Psychological Harm Suffered by Slaughterhouse Employees and the Possibility of Redress through Legal Reform, Georgetown Journal on Poverty Law & Policy 15.

  7. Situationism • Asch’sconformityexperiments (grouppressure) Asch, S. E. (1956). Studies of independence and conformity: A minority of one against a unanimous majority. Psychological Monographs,70 (416). • Bystander effect Latané, B., & Darley, J.M. (1970). The unresponsive bystander: Why doesn’t he help? Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. • Zimbardo’sprisoners experiment Zimbardo, P. G. (2004). A Situationist Perspective on the Psychology of Evil: Understanding How Good People Are Transformed Into Perpetrators. In A. G. Miller (Ed). The Social psychology of Good and Evil, New York, Guilford Press. • Milgram’sobedienceexperiments Milgram, S. (1974). Obedience to authority: An Experimental View. HarperCollins.

  8. Situationism • A reasonable motive (at first sight) : meat is nutritious, tradition ... • Eating animal products is not all or nothing: consumption can be increased in small steps without paying attention to it. • Victims (the animals) are not visible, advertisements on TV give a false impression of the livestock industry. • Easy to shift the responsibility to others, the butchers and fishermen. • Influenced by people in authority positions: parents, teachers, celebrities and politicians. • Others act as ifnothing is wrong. • Others with whom we feel a connection (family, friends and colleagues) stay calm and continue eating meat.

  9. Lessenpakket vlees kleuters Ik zal je wat vertellen: ik eet graag gehaktballetjes, salami op mijn boterham, een worstje in de pan, gebakken door mam, een biefstuk of saté, vlees vind ik best oké!

  10. Vegaphobia • Do-gooder derogation and anticipated reproach Monin, B., Sawyer, P.J., & Marquez, M.J. (2008). The rejection of moral rebels: Resenting those who do the right thing. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 95(1), p.76-93. Minson, J.A. & Monin, B. (2012) Do-Gooder Derogation. Disparaging Morally Motivated Minorities to Defuse Anticipated Reproach, Social Psychological and Personality Science vol. 3(2) p.200-207 • Vegaphobia Cole, M. & K. Morgan (2011), Vegaphobia: derogatory discourses of veganism and the reproduction of speciesism in UK national newspapers. The British Journal of Sociology, 62(1): 134-153.

  11. Sweepingourvaluesoff the table? • Meatfromdogsdisgusting • Kalfje Willy • Carrot Freddy? • Reactions of tomatoeater versus meateater • Inconsistency in ascribing mental abilities of animals • Panic when killing chicken with own hands • Rather smashing robot than chicken • PITS of slaughterhouseworkers • Hunting rituals instead of fruit picking rituals (hunters whispering into ear of animal) • Children spontaneously want to pet pigs and dogs instead of killing them • Emotional bond with animal but not with cauliflower • Parents want to shield their children from horrific images of livestockindustry • Psychologicalrepressionmechanisms (camouflage, detachment, dissociation, rationalization, euphemisms, shiftingresponsibility ...) • Cultures have culinary taboos about meat but not about vegetables. • Do-gooderderogation • “Youjust want us to feelguilty.”

  12. Interspecies model of prejudice • Dehumanization, bestialization Bandura, A., Underwood, B., & Fromson, M.E. (1975). Disinhibition of aggression through diffusion of responsibility and dehumanization of victims. Journal of Research in Personality, 9, 253–269. • Speciesism > racism Costello, K., & Hodson, G. (2010). Exploring the roots of dehumanization: The role of animal-human similarity in promoting immigrant humanization. Group Processes and Intergroup Relations, 13, 3-22. Costello, K., & Hodson, G. (2012). Explaining dehumanization among children: An interspecies model of prejudice. British Journal of Social Psychology.

  13. Terror management theory • Consciousness of ownmortality (fear of death) triggersspeciesism Goldenberg J.L., Pyszczynski T., Greenberg J., Solomon S., Kluck B., Cornwell R. (2001). I am not an animal: mortality salience, disgust, and the denial of human creatureliness. Journal of Experimental Psychology General. 130(3):427-35. Goldenberg, J. L., Heflick, N., Vaes, J., Motyl, M., & Greenberg, J. (2009). Of mice and men, and objectified women: A terror management account of infrahumanization. Group Processes & Intergroup Relations, 12, 763–776.

More Related