13-05-2025
The reason why vegetarians are repelled by meat
Many vegetarians feel disgust towards eating meat similar to the aversion widely felt towards cannibalism, research has found.
A study set out to investigate whether there was a difference in the psychological mechanisms by which people reject meat compared with vegetables.
In an online study involving 300 people, who were mostly vegetarians, researchers found people who rejected vegetables did so because they felt distaste – a simple aversion to the taste, texture or smell of a food.
In contrast, when people disliked and rejected meat that would be considered appetising by omnivores – such as roast chicken or beef steak – they felt the more complex emotion disgust, in a similar way that meat-eaters were disgusted by the idea of eating human meat.
Professor Natalia Lawrence, of the University of Exeter, said: 'This is the most robust evidence to date that we reject meat and vegetables that we find repellent based on different underlying processes.
'Obviously, finding meat disgusting can help people avoid eating it, which has health and environmental benefits.
'Other research we've conducted suggests that these feelings of disgust may develop when people deliberately reduce or avoid eating meat, such as during Veganuary.'
The study recruited 252 people who reject meat and 57 omnivores who eat meat.
Researchers tested responses to images of 11 different foods, such as palatable meat, olives, sprouts, aubergine and beetroot.
Participants were asked several questions about how eating each of the foods would make them feel.
Each question was linked to either disgust or distaste, which allowed the researchers to make a distinction between what people felt when they rejected different foods.
To compare reactions, the meat-eating participants were also shown images of substances overwhelmingly considered disgusting to eat, such as human flesh, dog meat and faeces.
Where participants said they would not eat the item pictured, they completed questions to investigate the grounds for rejection.
Consistently, people rejected vegetables they did not like based on distaste, and rejected meat and disgust elicitors in a strikingly similar disgust pattern.
Dr Elisa Becker, the study's lead author, said: 'Meat eaters responded to the idea of eating these truly disgusting substances like faeces in the same way that vegetarians responded to images of meat that they didn't want to eat, and this was very different from the way they responded to vegetables they rejected.
'Although we may think we're rejecting a food simply because we don't want to eat it, we showed that the basis for this rejection is quite different – and we think that's evolved to protect us from pathogens that can lie undetected in meat.'
The paper is published in the journal Appetite.
Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.
