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Of Meat and Men: Sex Differences in Implicit and Explicit Attitudes Toward Meat

Modern attitudes to meat in both men and women reflect a strong meat-masculinity association. Sex differences in the relationship between meat and masculinity have not been previously explored. In the current study we used two IATs (implicit association tasks), a visual search task, and a questionna...

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Autores principales: Love, Hamish J., Sulikowski, Danielle
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2018
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5920154/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29731733
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00559
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author Love, Hamish J.
Sulikowski, Danielle
author_facet Love, Hamish J.
Sulikowski, Danielle
author_sort Love, Hamish J.
collection PubMed
description Modern attitudes to meat in both men and women reflect a strong meat-masculinity association. Sex differences in the relationship between meat and masculinity have not been previously explored. In the current study we used two IATs (implicit association tasks), a visual search task, and a questionnaire to measure implicit and explicit attitudes toward meat in men and women. Men exhibited stronger implicit associations between meat and healthiness than did women, but both sexes associated meat more strongly with ‘healthy’ than ‘unhealthy’ concepts. As ‘healthy’ was operationalized in the current study using terms such as “virile” and “powerful,” this suggests that a meat-strength/power association may mediate the meat-masculinity link readily observed across western cultures. The sex difference was not related to explicit attitudes to meat, nor was it attributable to a variety of other factors, such as a generally more positive disposition toward meat in men than women. Men also exhibited an attention bias toward meats, compared to non-meat foods, while females exhibited more caution when searching for non-meat foods, compared to meat. These biases were not related to implicit attitudes, but did tend to increase with increasing hunger levels. Potential ultimate explanations for these differences, including sex differences in bio-physiological needs and receptivity to social signals are discussed.
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spelling pubmed-59201542018-05-04 Of Meat and Men: Sex Differences in Implicit and Explicit Attitudes Toward Meat Love, Hamish J. Sulikowski, Danielle Front Psychol Psychology Modern attitudes to meat in both men and women reflect a strong meat-masculinity association. Sex differences in the relationship between meat and masculinity have not been previously explored. In the current study we used two IATs (implicit association tasks), a visual search task, and a questionnaire to measure implicit and explicit attitudes toward meat in men and women. Men exhibited stronger implicit associations between meat and healthiness than did women, but both sexes associated meat more strongly with ‘healthy’ than ‘unhealthy’ concepts. As ‘healthy’ was operationalized in the current study using terms such as “virile” and “powerful,” this suggests that a meat-strength/power association may mediate the meat-masculinity link readily observed across western cultures. The sex difference was not related to explicit attitudes to meat, nor was it attributable to a variety of other factors, such as a generally more positive disposition toward meat in men than women. Men also exhibited an attention bias toward meats, compared to non-meat foods, while females exhibited more caution when searching for non-meat foods, compared to meat. These biases were not related to implicit attitudes, but did tend to increase with increasing hunger levels. Potential ultimate explanations for these differences, including sex differences in bio-physiological needs and receptivity to social signals are discussed. Frontiers Media S.A. 2018-04-20 /pmc/articles/PMC5920154/ /pubmed/29731733 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00559 Text en Copyright © 2018 Love and Sulikowski. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Psychology
Love, Hamish J.
Sulikowski, Danielle
Of Meat and Men: Sex Differences in Implicit and Explicit Attitudes Toward Meat
title Of Meat and Men: Sex Differences in Implicit and Explicit Attitudes Toward Meat
title_full Of Meat and Men: Sex Differences in Implicit and Explicit Attitudes Toward Meat
title_fullStr Of Meat and Men: Sex Differences in Implicit and Explicit Attitudes Toward Meat
title_full_unstemmed Of Meat and Men: Sex Differences in Implicit and Explicit Attitudes Toward Meat
title_short Of Meat and Men: Sex Differences in Implicit and Explicit Attitudes Toward Meat
title_sort of meat and men: sex differences in implicit and explicit attitudes toward meat
topic Psychology
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5920154/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29731733
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00559
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