Affective explicit and implicit attitudes towards vegetarian and vegan food consumption: The role of mindfulness

Abstract

Objectives: It was the main goal of this study to investigate the explicit and implicit affective attitudes towards vegetarian food and the role of mindfulness. The results were related to goal intention in the stage model of self-regulated sustainable behavior change.

Methods: 182 participants completed a demographic questionnaire, a mindfulness and a compassion scale, and answered questions about goal intention, personal and social norms. Besides, they completed an explicit rating task and an affective priming task.

Results: The results showed that people with an omnivorous diet explicitly rated meat-based food as more positive, while vegetarians and vegans rated vegetarian food as more positive. However, all participants rated vegetarian food implicitly as more positive. The observing aspect of mindfulness correlated only with the explicit attitude and with goal intention. The relation between observing and goal intention was mediated by personal norms. Compassion was not related to any attitude.

Conclusion: This study provides first evidence, that the relation of mindfulness with the explicit and implicit attitude towards vegetarian food differs and that explicit attitudes are influenced by the own nutrition habit. The results are discussed with respect to the topic of sustainability.

Keywords: Affective attitudes; Compassion; Food rating; Observing; Sustainability; Vegetarianism.