The humanity of what we eat. Conceptions of human uniqueness among vegetarians and omnivores (Bilewicz,Imhoff,Drogosz)

[Matjaz Kovse]

Dear research participant,



earlier this year you volunteered for a short online study on the
emotional life of animals. After having filled in the questionnaire you
indicated interest in the results of the study. The following is a short
summary of our research ideas and the results of the study you
participated in.

A complete research paper is currently being drafted and will be
submitted for scientific publication at the end of the month:



Bilewicz, N, Imhoff, R., & Drogosz, M. (in preparation). The
humanity of what we eat. Conceptions of human uniqueness among
vegetarians and omnivores.



Our study was based on the theoretical differentiation of two kinds of
emotions in the literature: primary and secondary emotions. Whereas
primary emotions refer to very basic and primitive emotions that are
commonly assumed to be felt by humans and animals (e.g., fear, panic,
excitement, joy) secondary emotions refer to more sophisticated,
cognitively-laden, cultural emotions that are commonly assumed to be
unique for humans (e.g., pride, nostalgia, shame, tenderness).

Previous research has shown that these two kinds of emotions are also
ascribed to different groups of humans to varying degrees. Whereas the
all humans are assumed to have (primitive) primary emotions, secondary
emotions are reserved for the own group. As an example, a British person
might think: "Well, yes, Africans have a very diverse emotional life,
they have joy, fear, panic and all these emotions, but my own group also
has more subtle emotions like nostalgia and melancholy".

Why would that be the case? As a straight-forward prediction one might
assume that it is just a matter of knowledge. Primary emotions can
easily be detected as they have rather specific correlates of emotional
expression (e.g., like a sad face or specific behavior like running
away). In contrast, secondary emotions may not be detected as easily --
can you tell from the outside whether someone is feeling nostalgic,
guilty, melancholic or just day-dreaming? It could be argued that
British persons see Africans from a distance (or through the media)
which allows them only to decipher the rather blatant primary emotions.
In contrast, their everyday experience and communication with common
British people exposes them to experiences or reports of the more subtle
secondary emotions.

However, several studies by now have shown that the ascription of less
secondary emotions to outgroups is not only a matter of knowledge but a
motivated process of moral disengagement. By denying outgroups uniquely
human characteristics, these are portrayed as "not quite human", thus
laying the foundation for legitimizing either past or current
inequalities. In an exemplary study, participants played a computer game
where they learned that their own group had either almost exterminated
an extraterrestrial species or not. It could be shown that particularly
those who learned that their group had almost exterminated the species
denied that they had any human characteristics in the first place.
Anecdotally, a similar reasoning was used by tyrannical regimes when
they declared specific group to be animals or non-human, like the Nazis
did with the Jews.



Our research now returned to the basic assumption of "uniquely human
emotions". A series of first studies had shown that people who eat meat
insist on a much sharper differentiation between secondary and primary
emotions, thus claiming more human uniqueness for secondary emotions.
This could be due to at least two different processes: Vegetarians could
extrahumanize animals and see them as more human than omnivores as a
motivated process of denying any hierarchies between humans and animals.
As a second alternative people who eat meat might deny that animals
resemble humans as a form of moral disengagement: being (at least
passively) involved in a process of slaughtering millions of animals
might evoke a need to distance from this by declaring that the victims
of this process had no human-like emotional life anyway.

From the latter explanation one can derive an interesting hypothesis. If
the latter is true, the difference between vegetarians and omnivores
(people who also eat meat) should be particularly pronounced for animals
that are regularly consumed. A beef-eater has no reason to ascribe less
secondary emotions to a snake than a vegetarian.

In our study we tried to exploit this presumed effect by manipulating
whether you were asked about the emotional life of pigs (commonly
consumed animal in the culture) or dogs (an animal not commonly consumed
in the culture of the research).

The results showed that vegetarians rated the likelihood of secondary
emotions in animals generally higher than omnivores but that this
difference was particularly pronounced for pigs: meat-eaters denied that
pigs have secondary emotions to a much greater degree than that they
denied secondary emotions for dogs. To rule out an alternative
explanation based on a general striving for no hierarchies among
vegetarians we further asked you to respond to 16 questions tapping into
general social dominance orientation. Social dominance orientation
describes a mindset that has been connected to legitimization of
existing hierarchies and inequalities. Although vegetarians had lower
scores than omnivores on this variable, this difference could not
account for the different ascription of secondary emotions in pigs.



Our preliminary conclusions are

.       The differentiation between primary and secondary emotions may
be subject to individual differences to a greater degree than previously
assumed

.       The denial of secondary emotions in animals by meat-eaters seems
to be a motivated process of moral disengagement



Of course, future research is necessary. Three out of many possible
directions might be

.       To conduct longitudinal studies by following people over a long
course in their life: do they become vegetarians because they see
animals as more human-like or did they just stop eating meat and thus
had no reason to morally disengage and "dehumanize" animals anymore

.       What happens if vegetarians will eat meat again (will they start
to show the omnivore-specific pattern again)

.       Will the pattern observed in the last study (pigs vs. dogs)
reverse in a culture where dogs are much more commonly consumed as food
than pigs?



At this point, we like to thank you for your participation in the study
and your interest in our research. Those of you who have luckily won the
gift card for the online story raffled among all participants have by
now received an email with their gift card.



Please do not hesitate to contact us concerning further inquiries.



Roland Imhoff & Michal Bilewicz











Some relevant literature:



Castano, E., & Giner-Sorolla, R. (2006). Not quite human:
Infra-humanization as a response to collective responsibility for
intergroup killing. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 90,
804-818.

Haslam, N., Bain, P., Douge, L., Lee, M., & Bastian, B. (2005). More
human than you: Attributing humanness to self and others. Journal of
Personality and Social Psychology, 89, 937-950.

Leyens, J.Ph., Paladino, P.M., Rodriguez, R.T., Vaes, J., Demoulin, S.,
Rodriguez, A.P. & Gaunt, R. (2000). The emotional side of prejudice:
The role of secondary emotions. Personality and Social Psychology
Review, 4, 186-197.



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______________________________

_____________________________________
Dipl.-Psych.
Roland Imhoff
Institut für Psychologie
Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn
Lehrstuhl für Sozial- & Rechtspsychologie
Kaiser-Karl-Ring 9
53111 Bonn

Tel.: [phone]

http://www.psychologie.uni-bonn.de/imhoff