Licence to kill? Investigating the moral licensing effect of meat reducing petitions on personal meat avoidance pledges

Author:

Bryant ChristopherORCID,Hancox AnnaORCID

Abstract

This paper investigated the possibility of moral licensing in the context of meat reduction. Specifically, we investigated the impact of petition-signing on personal commitment to meat reduction. In two studies, participants were assigned to a treatment condition, in which they had the opportunity to sign a petition to restrict meat in public sector catering, or a control condition, where they did not see the petition. All participants then indicated whether they would personally pledge a meat-free week. We compared personal pledge rates between petition-signers, non-signers, and the control group. In Study 1 (n = 166) we found that petition-signers were significantly more likely than the non-signers to pledge a meat-free week but were not significantly different from the control group. The non-signers, however, were significantly less likely to pledge a meat-free week than the control group. In Study 2 (n = 435) we added measures of meat attachment and environmental attitudes as covariates. We found that, in a model without covariates petition non-signing significantly predicted non-pledging. In a model with covariates, meat attachment significantly predicted pledging likelihood, but petition non-signing remained a significant predictor of pledging. These results show no moral licensing effects. In fact, we observe consistency between petition-signing and pledge-taking, though this is likely attributable to stable underlying attitudes rather than a consistency effect per se. Animal advocates should target advocacy requests towards those who are most likely to have positive underlying attitudes and avoid those who are likely to refuse.

Publisher

Leibniz Institute for Psychology (ZPID)

Cited by 1 articles. 订阅此论文施引文献 订阅此论文施引文献,注册后可以免费订阅5篇论文的施引文献,订阅后可以查看论文全部施引文献

同舟云学术

1.学者识别学者识别

2.学术分析学术分析

3.人才评估人才评估

"同舟云学术"是以全球学者为主线,采集、加工和组织学术论文而形成的新型学术文献查询和分析系统,可以对全球学者进行文献检索和人才价值评估。用户可以通过关注某些学科领域的顶尖人物而持续追踪该领域的学科进展和研究前沿。经过近期的数据扩容,当前同舟云学术共收录了国内外主流学术期刊6万余种,收集的期刊论文及会议论文总量共计约1.5亿篇,并以每天添加12000余篇中外论文的速度递增。我们也可以为用户提供个性化、定制化的学者数据。欢迎来电咨询!咨询电话:010-8811{复制后删除}0370

www.globalauthorid.com

TOP

Copyright © 2019-2024 北京同舟云网络信息技术有限公司
京公网安备11010802033243号  京ICP备18003416号-3