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More of a Bad Thing: How Consumers Ignore Pollutant Levels
Author(s) -
Tal Aner,
Wansink Brian
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
the faseb journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.709
H-Index - 277
eISSN - 1530-6860
pISSN - 0892-6638
DOI - 10.1096/fasebj.31.1_supplement.636.32
Subject(s) - ingredient , likert scale , pollutant , pesticide , toxicology , significant difference , environmental health , advertising , psychology , food science , medicine , mathematics , business , chemistry , agronomy , statistics , developmental psychology , biology , organic chemistry
Objective Assess whether consumers neglect consideration of pollutant quantity in determining food healthiness. In the current work, we argue that consumers heuristically consider the mere presence of a harmful ingredient in making healthiness judgments. The mere presence of a harmful food ingredient generates an emotional impact that leads consumers to see an ingredient as unhealthy. Contrary to that, the quantity of a harmful pollutant may be neglected, as it does not factor in to its emotional impact. Methods Participants (N = 98 Mechanical Turk participants) evaluated the healthiness of a depicted apple said to contain pesticide. Participants were randomly divided into three groups. One group was not told the apple contained pesticide called Carbaryl. The second group was told the apple contained 7.4 microgram of pesticide, and the third group was told the apple contained 4200 microgram of pesticide. The rated the healthiness of the apples on 9 point likert scales anchored by not at all healthy and very healthy. Results There was a significant effect of pesticide on health evaluation: F(1, 98) = 18.94, p < .0001. Planned contrast revealed differences between presence and absence of pesticide: F(1, 98) = 37.88, p<.0001, but no difference between the different levels of pesticide: F(1, 98) = .03, p = .87. Conclusion Consumer assessment of the healthiness of foods containing pollutants acts in an all‐ or‐nothing manner, considering the presence of a pollutant, but not its level. Consumers display an insensitivity to the quantity of a pollutant in assessing product healthiness. This might result from their inability to discriminate between different levels of the pollutant, and the fact that most of its impact is an emotional outcome of its mere presence.