Foregoing meat and other animal products purely for ethical reasons can cause tension between vegans and their friends, families, partners, businesses and even other vegans. These tensions are the subject of a new paper published in the Journal of Consumer Research. The study examines the relational fractures vegans sometimes experience and the strategies they use to navigate this challenge. The study identified four kinds of social skills vegans adopt to manage conflict: chameleoning, decoding, decoupling, and divesting.
PHYS.ORG: Going vegan is a life-changing decision. Successfully committing to eating only ethically sourced, non-exploitative products—no dairy, no honey, no eggs, no animal output of any kind—can be daunting, especially in a society where most people are omnivorous. Foregoing meat and other animal products purely for ethical reasons can cause tension between vegans and their friends, families, partners, businesses and even other vegans. These tensions are the subject of a new paper by Concordia researchers. Published in the Journal of Consumer Research, the study examines the relational fractures vegans sometimes experience and the strategies they use to navigate this challenge…
The study was led Aya Aboelenien, associate professor at HEC Montréal. Between 2017 and 2022, she conducted interviews, attended vegan festivals, protests and sit-ins to gain insight into how vegans managed interpersonal strains. Aboelenien also studied online news, videos, blogs and social media posts on sites like Reddit… “Many of the people I spoke to really wanted to discuss the personal struggles they faced, which in many instances discouraged them from maintaining a vegan lifestyle,” Aboelenien says. “Many of them just retreated from veganism because of the stress in their personal relationships”…
Aboelenien identified four kinds of social skills vegans adopt to manage conflict. First is decoding, in which vegans try to explain their choices to friends and family members… They may also try decoupling: behaving parallel to omnivores while actively avoiding conflict triggers. Examples include preparing and/or bringing one’s own meals to family gatherings so that they can share space… Other vegans practice divesting, where they avoid problematic food-related relationships whenever possible. This involves an uncompromising approach to the extent that they will not share meals with non-vegans. Finally, chameleoning involves navigating between one’s beliefs and a “go-along-to-get-along” posture, in which a person who considers themselves vegan will occasionally revert to an omnivorous diet to avoid conflict. PATRICK LEJTENYI
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