People who eat meat (called omnivores) often assume that others who avoid meat for moral reasons, such as protecting animals or the environment, are judging them as bad people. This feeling of being judged can make omnivores defensive, and sometimes even push them further away from considering a plant-based diet. In this research, we looked at whether morally-motivated vegetarians and vegans (we use the term ‘vegns’ to include both) can reduce this sense of judgment by showing self-compassion toward their past meat-eating self. Specifically, we tested whether a self-compassionate narrative—where a vegn reflects kindly on their own past meat-eating—helps morally-motivated vegns come across as less judgmental of omnivores. While this approach did help vegns seem less harsh toward their former selves, it did not stop omnivores from feeling judged by them. This suggests that the feeling of being judged may be more driven by omnivores’ own interpretation of the moral choice to stop eating meat than by how morally-motivated veg*ns actually talk about it.

Datasets of 2 studies and corresponding codebooks for Original Research article: 'Communicating meat-free principles without coming across as the veg*n judge - Is demonstrating self-compassion the antidote?'