Abstract
A substantial portion of produce harvested around the world is wasted because it does not meet consumers’ shape expectations. Only recently has research begun investigating the causes underlying misshapen produce rejection by consumers. Generally, this limited research has concluded that misshapen produce is subject to an ugly penalty, leading consumers to form biased expectations regarding product attributes (e.g., healthiness, tastiness, or naturalness). In this research, we propose that this ugly penalty extends to the moral valuation of misshapen produce and that this moral penalty is rooted in the feelings of disgust evoked by the visual appearance of such produce. Across five studies and two pilot studies, we show that misshapen fruits and vegetables are disgust elicitors, and that felt disgust causes consumers to make negative moral associations with produce which, in turn, leads to decreased preference. We also show that pairing misshapen produce with a positive unconditioned stimulus (i.e., an image of attractive individuals) is an efficient solution to counteract the effect of this stereotype. This research contributes to the growing body of work demonstrating the link between consumption behaviors, consumer preferences, and morality.
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Notes
In this research, we refer to non-misshapen produce as normally-shaped, in that these are the shapes that consumers normally (typically) expect and represent the market norms (or standards) for what the produce should look like. This is the universally adopted definition in extant literature. For example, Mookerjee et al. (2021) define misshapen produce as “that which has a significant natural aesthetic deviation in shape and/or color from prototypical produce, but has no damage or disease that could affect safety, taste, or nutrition” (p. 63). Misshapen may operate on a continuum where some shape differences are minor and un-noticeable, but we assume that these are not sorted out because they are too similar to prototypical produce, whereas some shape deviations are very obvious. While these more obvious deviations are likely sorted out before reaching the consumer, in the case that they are presented on shelves, consumers are more likely to notice them.
To clarify the differences between the three types of individual disgust traits, Tybur et al (2009) provide the following definitions: “pathogen disgust, which motivates the avoidance of infectious microorganisms; sexual disgust, which motivates the avoidance of sexual partners and behaviors that would jeopardize one’s long-term reproductive success; and moral disgust, which motivates the avoidance of social norm violator” (p. 103). Importantly, sensitivity to pathogen disgust is related to “infectious agents, including dead bodies, rotting foods, and bodily fluids such as feces, phlegm, vomit, blood, and semen, and it motivates proximal avoidance of such things” (p. 105) which it not at all related to misshapen produce, which we have conceptually outlined as being free of rot, bruising, or other indicators of decay. Furthermore, we argue that the disgust elicited by misshapen produce is non-pathogen related, and more aesthetically driven. This is also further shown in our Pilot Study.
A similar message is used by Kromkommer: https://www.kromkommer.com/english/
A similar message is used by Rubies in the Rubbel: https://rubiesintherubble.com/
Intermarché in France used this tactic: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/industry-news/marketing/dont-judge-a-fruit-by-how-ugly-it-is/article19876009/
As variances of the five groups were different for self-evaluation and feelings of disgust, we confirmed those findings with Mann–Whitney non-parametric tests. The two tests yielded convergent results.
One participant did not provide their age or gender.
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This study was funded by a research grant from a research chair internal to the school of the corresponding author.
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Appendices
Appendix A: Study Stimuli
Study 1: IAT (Normally Shaped Produce on the Left, Misshapen Produce on the Right)
Study 1: Explicit Measures
Study 2: Cherry
Study 3A: Ad Appeals (with Translations)
Posters for Study 3B
Appendix B: Pilot Study: Pathogens and Misshapen Produce
We conducted an additional study to test whether disgust influencing misshapen produce rejection is derived from the belief that it conveys pathogens. A sample composed of 84 French students was recruited in a business school to participate in a lab study (42.2% Male; Mage = 20.00 years old,Footnote 7SD = 0.80) and used a one-factor, two-level (tomato shape: misshapen vs. normally shaped) between-subjects design. Respondents were presented with one of the four tomatoes on a paper plate (top two tomatoes were the misshapen tomatoes and the bottom two were the normally shaped tomatoes), as seen below. The puncture wound on the top right tomato occurred after the study.
We measured purchase likelihood by asking respondents how likely they would be to buy the tomato on a scale of 1 = I would never buy this tomato to 7 = I would definitely buy this tomato. We then measured perceived pathogen risk with two items (“It is highly likely that this tomato contains harmful substances” and “This tomato is tainted”; r = 0.25, p < 0.05).
Mean comparisons revealed that the misshapen tomato was less likely to be purchased than the normally shaped tomato (Mmisshapen = 4.78, SD = 1.85; Mnormal = 5.53, SD = 1.37, F(1,82) = 4.49, p < 0.05. However, respondents did not perceive a higher risk of contamination or pathogens for the misshapen tomato vs the normally shaped tomato (Mmisshapen = 2.64, SD = 1.20; Mnormal = 3.01, SD = 1.35, F(1,82) = 1.78, p = 0.186).
Appendix C: Pilot Study: Tastiness, Healthiness, Morality, Disgust, and Misshapen Produce
As outlined by Mookerjee et al. (2021) taste and health expectations are signals of quality for food and they do not measure quality directly. As such, and to adequately compare our results to those of Mookerjee et al. (2021), we used measures from their research as quality and compared these to our core concepts: disgust and morality, both in a parallel mediation as well as placing them as covariates.
Method
A sample of 139 US respondents (48% Female; Mage = 36.17 years old, SD = 12.40) was recruited through an online panel managed by Prolific. Participants were randomly assigned to one of two conditions (standard lemon or misshapen lemon) in which they were invited to imagine that they were buying groceries from an online retailer. First, participants were exposed to a ficticious ad by an imagined grocer.
Respondents were then told to imagine they had made an online order with the e-grocer and their order included fruits and vegetables, and specifically a lemon. When they received and unpacked their order, they take the lemon out of the shopping bag and then they were presented with one of the two lemons (standard or misshapen).
Respondents were then asked what would be the probability that they would actually consume or use this lemon to make something to eat or drink using a single item seven-point bipolar scale anchored with improbable to very probable. Respondents then answered the three-item seven-point morality scale used in studies 1 and 2 (α = 0.84). They were then asked to rate their disgust emotional state on a scale of 1 = does not describe my feelings to 7 = clearly describes my feelings; we averaged the reported scores for disgust and nauseated as an index (r = 0.79, p < 0.001). We adapted a tastiness measure from Mookerjee et al. (2021) by having respondents answer how much they believed the lemon they received was tasty, flavorful, and delicious and they answered using a seven-point likert scale anchored with 1 = strongly disagree and 7 = strongly agree (α = 0.97). Likewise, we also used an adapted measure from Mookerjee et al. (2021) to measure perceived healthiness by having respondents answer how much they believed that the lemon was healthy, nutritional, and full of vitamins using a seven-point likert scale anchored with 1 = strongly disagree and 7 = strongly agree (α = 0.96). Finally, we asked respondents to tell us what they thought of the lemon using the same five-item manipulation check as in our previous studies (α = 0.97).
Results
Manipulation check. A one factor ANOVA with the condition (standard or misshapen lemon) as the factor and the aggregated manipulation check measure as the dependent variable revealed a significant effect of the condition (F(1,137) = 281.58, p < 0.001). Consumers faced with the misshapen lemon were less likely to want to consume it than those presented with the standard lemon (Mmisshapen = 2.53, SD = 1.47 vs. Mstandard = 6.12, SD = 1.02).
Main effects. A one factor ANOVA with the condition (standard or misshapen lemon) as the factor and consumption intentions as the dependent variable revealed a significant effect of the condition (F(1,137) = 25.81, p < 0.001). Consumers faced with the misshapen lemon were less likely to want to consume it than those presented with the standard lemon (Mmisshapen = 5.22, SD = 1.98 vs. Mstandard = 6.56, SD = 0.96). We found the same pattern of effects for morality, disgust, tastiness, and healthiness. Consumers perceived the misshapen lemon as less moral (F(1,137) = 60.48, p < 0.001; Mmisshapen = 4.36, SD = 1.26 vs. Mstandard = 5.83, SD = 0.95), more disgusting (F(1,137) = 38.79, p < 0.001; Mmisshapen = 2.51, SD = 1.43 vs. Mstandard = 1.26, SD = 0.86), less tasty (F(1,137) = 57.47, p < 0.001; Mmisshapen = 4.71, SD = 1.35 vs. Mstandard = 6.12, SD = 0.77), and less healthy (F(1,137) = 31.36, p < 0.001; Mmisshapen = 5.15, SD = 1.24 vs. Mstandard = 6.12, SD = 0.78).
Parallel mediation analysis. In the subsequent analyses, we contrasted all the proposed mediators (morality, disgust, tastiness, and healthiness) with the condition (standard vs misshapen lemon) as the independent variable and consumption likelihood as the dependent variable. The parallel mediation models (using Model 4 from PROCESS, Hayes, 2013) showed that perceived product morality mediated the effect of the lemon condition on consumption intentions (b = − 0.37, SE = 0.18, 95%CI [− 0.7377, − 0.0365]). Disgust was also a significant mediator (b = − 0.31, SE = 0.16, 95%CI [− 0.6477, − 0.0048]). Taste was a significant mediator (b = − 0.67, SE = 0.27, 95%CI [− 1.2309, − 0.1531]) but healthiness was not (b = − 0.27, SE = 0.17, 95%CI [− 0.6247, 0.0454]). The direct effect was not significant (b = 0.27, SE = 0.23, 95%CI [− 0.1731, 0.7185]).
Serial mediation analysis. As originally proposed in our theorizing, we tested the serial mediation effect of disgust and morality on consumption intentions. That is, misshapen produce leads to higher levels of disgust (b = 1.24, SE = 0.20, p < 0.001), disgust leads to lowered levels of morality (b = − 0.40, SE = 0.07, p < 0.001), and lowered morality leads to decreased consumption intentions (b = 0.61, SE = 0.10, p < 0.001). The indirect effect is significant (b = − 0.30, SE = 0.10, 95%CI [− 0.5256, − 0.1402]) and the direct effect is not significant (b = 0.11, SE = 0.25, 95%CI [− 0.3823, 0.5982]).
Discussion
Overall, this study demonstrates that morality plays an important role in determining consumption rejection of misshapen produce, and this even when accounting for tastiness and healthiness perceptions. Healthiness was not found to be a significant mediator. We expected tastiness to be a significant mediator as taste, disgust, morality, and consumption are intricately related. Consumers are less likely to consume foods they evaluate as less tasty, and often disgusting and foods deemed as having negative moral associations are perceived as having less taste, which explains lowered consumption intentions. The opposite is also true – tastier foods are perceived as less disgusting and more moral. Importantly, taste, disgust, and morality are theoretically linked (Eskine, 2013; Eskine et al., 2011). We also find this in our results when conducting the serial mediation of misshapen produce → disgust → morality → taste → consumption intentions and find a significant indirect effect (b = − 0.17, SE = 0.06, 95%CI [− 0.3122, − 0.0694]) and non-significant direct effect (b = 0.31, SE = 0.23, 95%CI [− 0.1346, 0.7591]), thereby confirming the role of moral associations in the relationship between disgust and taste for misshapen produce.
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Spielmann, N., Gomez, P. & Minton, E. The Role of the Ugly = Bad Stereotype in the Rejection of Misshapen Produce. J Bus Ethics 190, 413–437 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-023-05420-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-023-05420-1