Is being anti-vegan a distinct dietarian identity? An investigation with omnivores, vegans, and self-identified “ anti-vegans ”

Adding to research on the form and content of anti-vegan sentiment, recent scholarship has identified a group of individuals who self-subscribe as “ anti-vegan ” . Here, we sought to determine whether anti-veganism might reflect a distinct dietarian identity with its own unique ideological profile. Two-hundred and fourteen vegans, 732 omnivores, and 222 self-identified “ anti-vegans ” were assessed using a survey methodology that included the Dietarian Identity Questionnaire and ideological markers related to dark humour, social dominance orientation (SDO), speciesism, male-role norms, moral relativism, and attitudes toward science. Our analysis revealed a dietarian identity unique to anti-vegans. The dietary patterns of anti-vegans were more central to their identity than for omnivores, though marginally lower than vegans. Like vegans, anti-vegans scored highly on dietarian measures of private regard and personal dietary motivations, and lower than omnivores on public regard. The diets of anti-vegans were more morally motivated than omnivores. However, anti-vegans scored higher than both omnivores and vegans on a number of ideological measures including dark humour, SDO, speciesism, male-role norms, moral relativism, and distrust of science. Somewhat surprising, anti-vegans held greater trust than om-nivores in the science of plant-based nutrition. We discuss the unique dietarian identities of anti-vegans, considering both intra-group differences of omnivores


Introduction
Morally dubious behaviours polarise opinion and foster the adoption of conflicting identities (Bliuc et al., 2015).Consuming animal products, including meat, dairy and eggs, is an example of a highly valued but increasingly scrutinised practice (Gregson et al., 2022).Although many people value animal products for their taste (Graça et al., 2015), convenience (Lea et al., 2006) and nutritional profile (Piazza et al., 2015), their production and consumption has been linked to a range of public health, animal welfare, and ecological concerns (e.g., Poore & Nemecek, 2018).There is high consensus amongst both policy makers and academics that plant-forward diets can help address food sustainability, public health, climate change, and ecosystem degradation (Huang et al., 2020;IPCC, 2022;Willet et al., 2019).Consumers, likewise, are becoming aware of these issues (e.g., de Boer et al., 2013;Pohjolainen et al., 2016).As such, a commitment to not consuming animal products often relates to a person's identity and forms the basis of important social evaluations (Gregson et al., 2022;Rosenfeld, 2019).

Veganism: a dietary practice and identity
Veganism, at least in dietary terms, can be understood as the voluntary abstention from all or most animal-derived food products (The Vegan Society, 2021).There is strong evidence that over recent years vegan diets have increased in prevalence (e.g., see Asano & Biermann, 2019) and have received growing attention from both the public and academic communities (Ruby et al., 2023).Yet, despite its absolute growth in recent years, veganism remains a relatively unpopular practice.An investigation that sampled 28 countries from all six inhabited continents estimated that approximately 3% of the global population identify as vegan, though rates of veganism varied at a rate of 0-19% ( IPSOS Mori, 2018).Demographically, vegans are more likely to be female (IPSOS Mori., 2018) and politically left-leaning individuals, who endorse a more liberal worldview (Asher et al., 2014).They are thought to be well-educated, urban dwellers, who display an inclination for secular views on religious matters (Asher et al., 2014).
Though oft-considered a behavioural response to the current health and ecological crises, veganism is a lifestyle with ancient roots, diverse cultural expressions and a deep philosophical underpinning (Zaraska, 2016).At its core, veganism is a philosophy and lifestyle which seeks to avoid all forms of animal exploitation and cruelty (The Vegan Society, 2021).Proponents of vegan diets are motivated by a multitude of personal, prosocial and moral factors and tend to share core ideological values (Rosenfeld, 2018;Ruby, 2012).Most commonly, vegans report animal ethics as a key driver of their vegan lifestyle (Janssen et al., 2016;Rosenfeld, 2018).Hence, the adoption of a vegan lifestyle entails more than the acquisition of a new diet.It includes the formation of a social identity (de Boer et al., 2017;Tajfel & Turner, 1979).
As part of a move toward understanding meat-eating behaviour from a social identity perspective, Rosenfeld and Burrow (2018) formulated the dietarian identity -a theoretical framework for understanding one's thoughts, feelings, and behaviours with respect to consuming or eschewing animal products.Dietarian identity involves the centrality, motivations, group perceptions, and strictness of a person's diet-based identity (Rosenfeld & Burrow, 2018).Using this framework, research has considered the unique profiles of vegans compared to vegetarians (Rosenfeld, 2019), and vegans and vegetarians compared to omnivores (Kirsten et al., 2020).Work in this area generally converges on the conclusion that, relative to vegetarians and omnivores, vegans showcase a unique dietarian identity.Specifically, vegans consider their diet to be more central to their overall sense of self and hold members of their dietary in-group in greater esteem.Compared to dietary out-groups, vegans also report stronger personal, prosocial, and moral motivations for following their diet and adhere to their diet more strictly.Furthermore, vegans judge dietary out-groups more harshly, and feel more stigmatized by others on the basis of their vegan membershipfeelings which may reinforce their strong group identification (Bagci et al., 2022;Branscombe et al., 1999).

Vegan prejudice
Vegans, represent a challenge or threat to the majority view and draw attention to the potential issues with animal agriculture (Kurz et al., 2020).As such, they are often met with resentment and can elicit irritation in those who consume animal products (De Groeve et al., 2021;Dhont & Hodson, 2014;Rothgerber, 2014).Indeed, prejudicial views toward vegans have prevailed for many decades (Iacobbo & Iacobbo, 2004) and appear often in popular media (Cole & Morgan, 2011;Ragusa et al., 2014).Impressions of vegans as moralistic (e.g., self-righteous, opinionated, judgmental) and extreme (e.g., militant, overbearing) account for much of antipathy and discrimination against them (De Groeve et al., 2021), which is consistent with the idea that vegans pose a symbolic or ideological threat to omnivores.Also consistent with the symbolic-threat account, studies show that prejudice towards vegans is particularly high among demographics that report high meat consumption, e.g., cis-gendered males (Vandermoere et al., 2019), politically right-leaning individuals (Dhont & Hodson, 2014), those who endorse traditional views of gender (Earle & Hodson, 2017), and those who endorse hierarchical views of society and dominating attitudes towards animals (e.g., speciesism; Dhont et al., 2016;Leite et al., 2018).

Self-identified anti-vegans
The research conducted to date has been invaluable in advancing our scientific understanding of vegan prejudice.However, this research has largely focused on the nature of anti-vegan sentiments expressed by members of the general public when solicited by questions or measures in surveys or experimental research.Studies of naturally-occurring vegan antagonism, thus, can help provide a fuller picture of the prevalence, form, and content of anti-vegan sentiment.Indeed, the proliferation of the internet and other digital technologies has provided both new opportunities and methods to study anti-vegan sentiment.Over the last decade, individuals who strongly endorse anti-vegan sentiments and self-subscribe as "anti-vegan" have organised, both online and offline, around their shared views on veganism.Anti-vegan communities have emerged on popular social media platforms like Facebook and Reddit (Gregson et al., 2022).Offline, self-identified "anti-vegans" have engaged in actions such as graphic displays of animal consumption in public restaurants and at vegan food festivals (Reynolds, 2019).Research into the discourse and behaviour of self-identifying "anti-vegan" groups may provide new insights into the form and content of anti-vegan sentiment.
Recently, Gregson et al. (2022) took a novel approach to studying anti-vegan groups.Using data derived from the popular social media platform, Reddit, the authors analysed the discourse and behavioural patterns of r/AntiVegan users.Their work suggests that anti-vegans' opposition to veganism extends beyond a dislike of moralistic vegans, and incorporates complex ideological perspectives on health, morality, animal death, and science.In this research, anti-vegans were observed expressing views on animal suffering and death that were both proudly speciesist and resonant with a moral relativist stance.In a similar vein, anti-vegans were highly critical of moral absolutism, of which they felt that vegan ideology was built upon.Indeed, so-called "militant" vegans were those who were seen to be endorsing a particularly strong absolutist moral position.Anti-vegans viewed vegan diets as inadequate, even damaging to human health.This critical position of the health implications of veganism was formed in relation to scientific literature and in consultation with former vegans.r/AntiVegan posts involved critical and nuanced discourse of scientific evidence, and espoused scepticism towards research that supported the health benefits of a vegan diet.Based on other subreddits frequented by r/AntiVegan users, and compared to the wider population on Reddit, anti-vegans evidenced a particular concentration on anti-vegan content, and an affinity for dark humour.While this work was consistent with earlier learnings, it sparked a commentary around how the expression of anti-vegan sentiment may be psychologically distinct from the adoption of an anti-vegan identity.The self-identified anti-vegans in Gregson et al.'s (2022) study presented a complex critique of vegan behaviours and beliefs, as opposed to merely expressing antipathy towards vegan actors.

The current study and hypotheses
In the current study, our main aim was to determine whether selfidentifying "anti-vegans" would exhibit a unique dietarian identity and ideological profile relative to both omnivores and vegans.Accordingly, we engaged in a rich, comparative exploration of the dietarian identities and ideological correlates of individuals who identify as "antivegan".Though our approach was largely exploratory, we did anticipate and preregister a few predictions based on suggestive lines of evidence stemming from Gregson et al.'s (2022) analysis of r/AntiVegan discourse and previous studies of vegan prejudice (see pre-registration document at AsPredicted.org#92722).First, we predicted that the dietary expression of anti-vegans would be more personally motivated than both omnivores and vegans given their strong convictions about the health consequences of a vegan diet and the necessity of animal protein for optimal nutrition.Second, consistent with previous literature, we predicted that vegans would be more morally motivated and their diet central to their identity at rates higher than both omnivores and anti-vegans because of the restrictiveness of vegan diets and its ethical basis (Kirsten et al., 2020;Rosenfeld, 2019).We made no specific prediction about whether anti-vegans would view their dietary habits as more "central" to their identity than omnivores, though such a prediction might be inferred from the strong attitudes anti-vegans express regarding the moralisation of animal-product consumption (Gregson et al., 2022).
Regarding the ideological profile of anti-vegans, we explored some of the themes that emerged in the online discourse and subreddit behaviour of r/AntiVegans (Gregson et al., 2022).Our comparative hypotheses were based upon observations made by Gregson et al. (2022), but also wider findings on vegan prejudice (discussed earlier).We hypothesised R. Gregson et al. that anti-vegans would perceive veganism to be a greater symbolic or ideological threat than omnivores.In line with previous perspectives (e. g., Leite et al., 2018), we hypothesised that anti-vegans would score higher on measures of social dominance orientation (SDO), speciesism, and traditional male-role endorsement than both omnivores and vegans-in other words, they would represent a more extreme subclass of omnivores in this regard.Based on r/AntiVegans' wider Reddit activity (Gregson et al., 2022), we anticipated that, relative to vegans and omnivores, anti-vegans would find greater entertainment in "dark" or aggressive humour-an interest that has been previously linked to right-wing ideologies (Hodson et al., 2010).Further, given r/AntiVegans' critique of vegans' use of moral absolutism, we anticipated that anti-vegans would adopt a more relativist approach to morality than both omnivores and vegans.Lastly, based on the critical stance of r/AntiVegans towards studies that support vegan diets, we hypothesised that relative to vegans and omnivores, anti-vegans would be less trusting of science, particularly research in support of plant-forward diets.
We also pre-registered a number of loose predictions about how our outcome variables might correlate with one another.This analysis was largely exploratory, though somewhat guided by previous work which has observed correlations between: vegetarian threat, SDO, speciesism, dark humour, and masculinity (Dhont & Hodson, 2014;Dhont et al., 2016;Hodson et al., 2010;Salmen & Dhont, 2022;Swami et al., 2013).As such, we anticipated that SDO would positively correlate with veganism threat, speciesism, dark humour, and male-role norm endorsement.We also expected that anti-vegan identification (as measured by our anti-vegan identification scale) would positively correlate with veganism threat, therefore, increasing confidence in the scale's use for identifying anti-vegans.

Recruitment strategy
We calculated a priori that a lower-bound sample of N = 390 (or 130 per group) would give us 0.95 power to detect a modest effect size (f = 0.20) with an error probability of 0.05.To account for attrition and exclusions, we aimed to over-sample using an upper-bound sample target of 480 participants (or 160 per group).Recruitment was conducted across two waves and spanned a period of eight months (April to November 2022).Both waves of recruitment were approved by Lancaster University's Faculty of Science and Technology Ethics Committee.
Our original recruitment strategy (AsPredicted #92722) was to recruit all participants via the online crowdsourcing platform, Prolific.Prolific was desirable given that it allowed us to recruit individuals from the UK, sample "vegans" separately from non-vegans, and obtain gender-balanced samples (i.e., 50/50 representation of males and females).In the initial wave of recruitment, non-vegan participants completed a 17 min survey and were compensated £2.41 their time.Vegan participants completed a somewhat shorter survey, excluding measures pertaining to anti-vegan identification and veganism threat and were compensated £2.00 for approximately 14 min of their time.A rate of £8.50/hour applied to all participants.
Our original recruitment plan (AsPredicted #92722) was to identify a subset of anti-vegan identifying indiviudals from the larger pool of omnivorous sample, using a 6-item anti-vegan identification measure.These items had a max score of 42; our pre-registered plan was to place participants who scored in the upper third (i.e., score of 28 or more) into the anti-vegan group.However, only n = 3 participants satisfied this criterion.Hence, before conducting further analyses, we altered our recruitment strategy for anti-vegans.We submitted a second preregistration document (AsPredicted #96141) outlining our new strategy, which involved identifying self-proclaimed "anti-vegans" on the popular social media platform, Twitter.We chose to use Twitter because of its wide popularity and its hashtag functionality which helps to tailor tweets to user interests.To attract people sympathetic to anti-vegan ideology, we used a number of Twitter hashtags common to antivegan discourse.Two members of the research team tweeted the following: "Are you opposed to veganism?Take part in this survey, for a 1 in 3 chance of winning a £50 amazon voucher.[Survey link] #antivegan #carnivore #meat #exvegan #carnivorediet #antiveganism #eatmeat #meatlover #carnivorememes #meatheals #antiveganmeme".Compensation involved the chance to win one of three £50 Amazon vouchers.
The first wave of recruitment yielded 523 survey responses.Twentytwo of these were subsequently excluded for providing incomplete data or because they indicated a dietary orientation incompatible with the pre-registered inclusion criteria for omnivores.A further 26 participants were excluded because they indicated a dietary orientation incompatible with the pre-registered inclusion criteria for vegans.The three participants that met the threshold for anti-vegan identification were retained for the anti-vegan group.Hence, after exclusions, our first wave yielded 151 vegans, 321 omnivores, and three anti-vegans.
The second wave of recruitment yielded 895 survey responses.Of these, n = 94 participants were excluded for providing incomplete data and n = 99 were further excluded for failing to meet the eligibility criteria for any of the three dietary groups.Wave two yielded an additional n = 72 vegans, nine of whom simultaneously identified as antivegan and were subsequently removed.The remaining n = 63 vegans were retained and combined with vegan participants from the first wave.A further n = 411 participants met the pre-registered inclusion criteria for omnivores.Our second wave of recruitment was more successful for recruiting anti-vegans and yielded a total of n = 219 participants who qualified as anti-vegan identifiers.Hence, after two waves of recruitment the final data set included n = 732 omnivores, n = 222 antivegans, and n = 214 vegans.
Our secondary approach to participant recruitment meant that we were unable to control for gender-balanced samples.Thus, we tested for significant gender-based differences across the three dietary groups.This analysis revealed that the three dietary groups differed significantly in their gender-identity profiles, χ 2 (8, N = 1168) = 21.73,p < .005,Cramer's V = 0.10.Post-hoc Chi-square tests, adjusting alpha to p < .01 for multiple comparisons (i.e., p = .05/3= 0.0167), revealed a statistically significant difference in gender distribution when comparing vegans and anti-vegans, χ2 (4, N = 436) = 19.40,p < .001,Cramer's V = 0.21, with relatively more males to females [63:37] in the anti-vegan group than in the vegan group [46:51].Gender distributions did not differ significantly between omnivores [57:41] and vegans, χ2 (4, N = 946) = 11.97,p = .018,Cramer's V = 0.11, and omnivores and antivegans, χ2 (4, N = 954) = 5.31, p = .257,Cramer's V = 0.08.Given these gender discrepancies between dietary groups, we made the decision to conduct an additional set of analyses, employing a conservative method for controlling the effects of gender identity.The details of this analysis are outlined in Section 2.5 Analysis Plan.
There was a statistically significant difference in age across groups, F

Materials
All scales and scale items can be found in Supplementary Materials A.

Dietary classification and behaviour
Participants completed a pre-existing scale of dietary classification (Piazza et al., 2018).Participants were asked to select the category that best described their dietary identity: (1) meat lover (I prefer to have meat in all or most of my meals), (2) omnivore (I eat meat and other animal products, like dairy and/or eggs), (3) semi-vegetarian or reducetarian (I eat meat, but only on rare occasions or only certain types of meat), (4) pescatarian (I eat fish and/or seafood, as well as dairy products and eggs, but no other meat), (5) lacto-or ovo-vegetarian (I eat dairy products and/or eggs, but no meat or fish), (6) strict vegetarian (I eat no animal products, including dairy and eggs, but would not consider myself full vegan), (7) dietary vegan (I eat no animal products, including dairy, eggs, honey, gelatin, etc.) and (8) lifestyle vegan (I never consume any animal products, and avoid all non-food animal products, including leather, silk, wool, cosmetics containing animal ingredients, etc).We included this measure to check the success of the Prolific pre-screening tools and to make any necessary exclusions based on the eligibility criteria.Participants were also asked: "In the past, have you identified with a different dietary classification?"(Yes/No).If participants selected the affirmative, they indicated from the eight dietary classifications how they had previously identified and how long ago they had stopped identifying this way, from 1 = very recent to 5 = many years ago.

Anti-vegan identification
To assess anti-vegan identification, we had non-vegan participants complete a 6-item scale, designed by the researchers for this specific purpose.Items included: "I dislike vegans", "I often find vegans to be annoying", "I often talk with others about my dislike for vegans", "I would be open to joining an online anti-vegan community", "I find it easy to get along with vegans" [reverse scored], "I identify as 'antivegan' (i.e., someone who opposes veganism as a movement)".Participants indicated their agreement with each item on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree; 7 = strongly agree).The scale had good reliability (α = 0.86).
To verify the validity of our approach to anti-vegan identification we employed an adapted version of the eight-item Vegetarianism Threat Scale (Dhont & Hodson, 2014), a measure of the extent to which individuals feel threatened by the existence of veganism.The scale was adapted by replacing mention of "vegetarianism" with "veganism".
Example items include: "The rise of veganism poses a threat to our country's cultural norms"; "Important culinary traditions which are typical to our country, are starting to die out because of the rise of veganism".Participants indicated their agreement with each item on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree; 7 = strongly agree), with higher scores indicating a stronger perception of threat (α = 0.93).

Dietarian identity
The Dietarian Identity Questionnaire (DIQ; Rosenfeld & Burrow, 2018) was used to measure participants' thoughts, feelings, and behaviours with respect to their eating habits or "dietary patterns".The DIQ assesses dietarian identity across eight subscales including: centrality (α = 0.94), private regard (α = 0.85), public regard (α = 0.93), out-group regard (α = 0.95), prosocial motivation (α = 0.97), personal motivation (α = 0.87), moral motivation (α = 0.92), and strictness (α = 0.88).Centrality relates to the importance of a person's diet for their self-concept.Private regard refers to a person's own feelings toward following their diet, while public regard involves a person's feelings about how the wider society view people who follow their diet.Out-group regard measures a person's evaluation of people who do not follow their dietary pattern.Three subscales measure a person's motivations behind their dietary identity: personal (concern with the benefit to oneself), moral (concern with rightness and wrongness) and prosocial (concern with the benefits beyond oneself) motivations.Lastly, strictness measures how stringently a person adheres to their diet.Participants indicated their agreement with each item on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree and 7 = strongly agree).

Dark humour
To measure the extent to which participants found entertainment in others suffering, i.e., "dark", aggressive or disparagement humour, we employed the Humour Style Questionnaire (Martin et al., 2003), specifically, the eight-item aggressive humour subscale.Example items include: "When telling jokes or saying funny things, I am usually not very concerned about how other people are taking it"; "Even if something is really funny to me, I will not laugh or joke about it if someone will be offended" [reverse scored].Participants indicated their agreement with each item on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 7 = strongly agree) with higher scores indicating greater endorsement of dark humour.The subscale had near-satisfactory reliability (α = 0.67).1

Social dominance orientation
SDO entails support for social hierarchies and the belief that certain groups are superior to other groups.We employed a shortened six-item version of the Social Dominance Orientation scale (Pratto et al., 1994).Example items include: "Some groups of people are just more worthy than others"; "Superior groups should dominate inferior groups"; "We must increase social equality" [reverse scored].Participants indicated their agreement with each item on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 7 = strongly agree) with higher scores indicating stronger endorsement of social dominance (α = 0.77).

Speciesism
Speciesism entails the degree to which someone endorses discrimination based on species membership (e.g., in favour of a person over an animal, or one species over another species), while holding all else equal (Singer, 1975).To measure this construct, we employed the six-item Speciesism scale (Caviola et al., 2019).Example items include: "Morally animals always count for less than humans"; "Humans have the right to use animals however they want to".Participants indicated their agreement with each item on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 7 = strongly agree), with higher scores indicating stronger speciesism endorsement (α = 0.85).

Male role norms
To measure the extent to which participants endorsed traditional gender roles, particularly those pertaining to masculinity, we employed the eight-item Male Role Norms scale (Pleck et al., 1994).Example items include: "A man always deserves the respect from his wife and children"; "A guy will lose respect if he talks about his problems".Participants indicated their agreement with each item on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 7 = strongly agree), with higher scores indicating stronger endorsement male role norms (α = 0.83).

Moral relativism
Moral relativism is the meta-ethical stance that asserts that there is no epistemological framework by which to judge between competing moral claims (e.g., that it is wrong vs. not wrong to harm cows), since all moral claims are merely expressions of opinion or cultural values and cannot be established as objectively true or untrue.To measure endorsement of moral relativism, we employed the 10-item moral relativism subscale of the Ethics Position Questionnaire (Forsyth, 1980).Example items include: "What is ethical varies from one situation and society to another"; "Moral standards should be seen as being individualistic; what one person considers to be moral may be judged to be immoral by another person".Participants indicated their agreement with each item on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 7 = strongly agree), with higher scores indicating stronger endorsement of moral relativism (α = 0.87).

Trust in science
We sought to measure both generalised trust in science and trust specifically in plant-based science.To do this, we employed two scales.The first, the 21-item Trust in Science and Scientists Inventory (Nadelson et al., 2014), measured generalised trust.Example items include: "I trust scientists can find solutions to our major technological problems"; "I trust the work of scientists to make life better for people"; "We cannot trust scientists because they are biased in their perspectives" [reverse scored].Participants indicated their agreement with each item on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree; 7 = strongly agree), with higher scores indicating stronger trust in science and scientists (α = 0.91).
To measure trust in science on plant-based nutrition specifically, the research team devised a five-item measure.Example items include: "1 kg of plant protein requires 18 times less land, 10 times less water and times fewer fossil fuels than that which would be needed to produce a kg of beef protein (Sabate et al., 2014)" and "Livestock production is responsible for 80% of agricultural greenhouse gas emissions worldwide (McMichael et al., 2007)".Participants indicated the extent to which they trusted each finding on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = not at all trustworthy to 7 = highly trustworthy) with higher scores indicating stronger trust in the science on plant-based nutrition (α = 0.88).

Procedure
The survey was completed online.After providing their informed consent, participants responded to items in the following order: demographic information, dietary classification, dietarian identity, dark humour, SDO, trust in science, speciesism, moral relativism, and male role norms.Omnivorous and anti-vegan participants additionally completed, at the end of the survey, items concerning veganism threat and their anti-vegan identification.

Analysis plan
We first probed the relationship between the anti-vegan identification scale, veganism threat scale, and outcome variables, to assess the strength of our method for identifying anti-vegans.Next, as per our preregistered analysis plan, we conducted an exploratory correlation analysis to determine the relationship between outcome variables.Given the age discrepancies between the three dietary groups, we conducted further correlational analyses to determine any meaningful relationships between age and the outcome variablessee Supplementary Materials B for these results.As preregistered, we used ANCOVA in lieu of ANOVA where age correlated with the respective outcome variable.A series of between-subjects ANOVAs (or ANCOVAs) were then conducted to determine significant mean group differences.Where a main effect of dietary group was observed, we followed up with Bonferroni-corrected pairwise t-tests for group contrasts, where alpha was adjusted to p < .0167for multiple comparisons (i.e., p = .05/3= 0.0167).Given the gender discrepancies between the three dietary groups we repeated the main analyses, with only male participantsthe results of these additional analysis are viewable in Supplementary Materials C).This approach produced comparable findings for all variables, though with slight deviations for dietarian centrality and motivations.Given that our final sample exceeded that outlined in our pre-registration, we conducted a post-hoc power analysis to determine the risk of Type I errors for effect sizes d > 0.20 (effect sizes below 0.20 were not significant even with the increase in power).Effects sizes within the range of d = 0.20 to 0.28 were at risk of Type 1 error and were not significant under conditions of lower power (see Supplementary Materials D).Thus, effect sizes within this range should be interpreted with some level of caution.

Anti-vegan identification
Assessment of the anti-vegan identification and veganism threat scales provides assurances of our method.The two scales were strongly correlated, r (952) = 0.75, p < .001.Furthermore, anti-vegan participants exhibited significantly higher veganism threat scores (M = 5.22, SD = 0.44) compared to omnivores (M = 2.75, SD = 1.16), t (952) = − 31.15,p < .001,d = 2.82.Additionally, the two scales had comparable relationships with key individual difference variablessee Table 2.For example, both scales evidenced a strong positive correlation with dark humour, SDO, speciesism, moral relativism and male-role norms and a strong negative correlation with trust in science.Based on this initial investigation, we were assured of our approach for ascertaining antivegan identification.

Correlations: dietarian identity and ideological variables
In our investigation of the relationship between the DIQ subscales and the ideological variables, across the entire sample, a number of key relationships emergedsee Table 3.We observed significant associations between the eight subscales of the DIQ which were consistent with the strength and direction of intercorrelations previously reported, both during scale development (Rosenfeld & Burrow, 2018), and later works (e.g., see Kristen et al., 2020); diet centrality, private regard, prosocial, personal and moral motivations, as well as strictness, were positively related to one another and negatively related to public and outgroup regard.As expected, we observed positive correlations between scores of SDO, dark humour, speciesism, moral relativism endorsement and male role norms.By contrast, SDO was negatively related to trust in science and trust in science on plant-based nutrition, variables which were positively related to each other.Further to our expectations, we found a positive relationship between dark humour and male-role norm endorsement.

Dietarian identity
For the DIQ dimensions, all analyses of variance revealed a main effect of dietary group.Follow up Bonferroni-corrected pairwise t-tests revealed several differences between vegans, omnivores and antivegans.Table 4 [0.14, 0.49].Hence, vegans reported adhering to their diet more strictly than both omnivores and antivegans, and omnivores adhered to their diet more strictly than antivegans.

Discussion
A wealth of past research has explored the ideological underpinnings of prejudice towards vegans (e.g., Dhont et al., 2016;Dhont & Hodson, 2014).More recently, research suggests that there exists a group of individuals who hold strong "anti-vegan" views (Aguilera-Carnerero & Carretero-González, 2021; Gregson et al., 2022).Accordingly, new research has begun to unpack the social psychological profiles of individuals who self-identify as "anti-vegan" via the discourse they share in organised online groups (Gregson et al., 2022).In the current study, we sought to advance on these perspectives by more directly probing the dietarian identities of individuals who identify as "anti-vegan", and by contrasting their profile with omnivores who lack a strong anti-vegan identity and the targets of their antagonism, vegans.In doing so, we sought to build a richer portrait of the dietarian and ideological identities of anti-vegans, taking clues from past research, as a way to better understand the strength and source of their dietary convictions.
Broadly, our investigation returned two key sets of findings.First, we found evidence that anti-vegans possess a unique dietarian identity that differs in many ways from omnivores, but that also shares some similarities with vegans.Second, we found that anti-vegans have a unique ideological profile that differs in many ways from both omnivores and vegans.This profile helps clarify their heightened antagonism towards vegan practices.We discuss these findings, and related research in turn, below.

Dietarian identities of anti-vegans
Past theorising has suggested that more restrictive dietary patterns lend themselves to stronger dietarian identities, for example, higher centrality and stronger personal motivations (Kirsten et al., 2020).We certainly found this to be true for vegans.Consistent with previous research on vegans' dietarian identities (e.g., Rosenfeld, 2019), vegans had the most pronounced dietarian identity profiles, scoring highest of the three groups on diet centrality, prosocial motivations, and moral motivations.These results are easily explained by considering the degree of food restrictiveness that vegans exercise (Kirsten et al., 2020) and the core ethical values that they widely endorse (e.g., Janssen et al., 2016;Rosenfeld, 2019).
Nonetheless, we observed a great deal of overlap between vegans and anti-vegans that cannot be explained simply by contrasting the restrictiveness of vegans and anti-vegans or by considering how strict or flexible anti-vegans are in their eating patterns.Despite anti-vegans' relaxed approach to eating, they scored higher than omnivores on diet centrality, and their dietary practices were just as personally motivated as vegans' dietary practices.Compared to omnivores, their eating habits were also more morally and prosocially motivated, albeit less so than vegans.That the diets of anti-vegans are more morally motivated than omnivores, and more central to their identity, likely reflects their higher level of interest in the topics of meat, dietary nutrition, and morality (Gregson et al., 2022).Gregson et al. (2022) found that "anti-vegans" communicating on Reddit engaged in rich discourse on the topics of vegan diets (e.g., their nutritional inadequacy), the inevitability of animal suffering to feed people, and opposition to moral absolutism and what they perceived as misanthropy from vegans.Furthermore, many members of the subreddit group were ex-vegans who had become disaffected with their former diet.Thus, anti-vegans appear to be individuals who take a strong ideological and moral stance towards food, however, one that is more pragmatic and relativistic rather than idealistic and objectivistic.
Anti-vegans also set themselves apart from omnivores by exhibiting the least regard for other dietary groups.Previous studies have shown that vegans tend to show low-levels of regard for other dietary groups, probably due to their core ethical principles which are not adopted by other dietary groups (Rosenfeld, 2019).By contrast, our findings isolate a group of individuals that score even lower than vegans on out-group regard.These findings might be best interpreted in light of anti-vegans' resistance to the moralisation of eating (Gregson et al., 2022), an interpretation that finds convergent support in the results regarding moral-relativism endorsement (discussed below).Additionally, anti-vegans may be particularly reactive to other dietary groups on account of feeling that their relativistic perspective on food is becoming increasingly threatened by the societal embrace of plant-forward diets (Bagci et al., 2022).
That vegans and anti-vegans did not differ on personal motivations for eating, both significantly higher than omnivores on this dimension, speaks to the distinctiveness of "anti-veganism" as a dietarian identity.Previous research has shown that personal health is a key motivator for both vegans (Rosenfeld, 2019) and anti-vegans (Gregson et al., 2022).However, it is also a clear point of inter-group contention, with anti-vegans strongly refuting the argument that an all-plant-based diet is nutritionally adequate or optimal for human health (Gregson et al., 2022).Thus, personal health may be a dimension on which the values of anti-vegans and vegans are compatible, but their views highly diverge.This divergence of views speaks to the polarisation between vegans and anti-vegans and likely contributes to their lower levels of out-group regardthough future research should test this inference more directly.
Two final points of similarity between vegans and anti-vegans have to do with their regard for their own dietarian group, and how they think other groups perceive them.Vegans and anti-vegans in our study held their own group in high esteem.They also thought that other groups held their group in low esteem.A key source of vegan prejudice is that of "anticipated moral reproach" (Minson & Monin, 2011), the prediction that vegans will judge non-vegans harshly for not following their dietary pattern.Indeed, previous studies have found that much of the prejudice towards vegans derives from the perception of vegans as self-righteous and overly critical of others (De Groeve et al., 2021).Vegans in our sample anticipated that other groups held them in low esteem, perhaps partly for this reason (see also Rosenfeld, 2019).Nonetheless, anti-vegans also believed that other groups held them in low esteem.This cannot be for the same reasons as vegans, since anti-vegans' approach to eating is entirely non-moralistic (Gregson et al., 2022).Their understanding of their group's low public regard likely comes from a different source-for example, the awareness that their antagonism towards vegans may not be endorsed with the same fervour outside of their own community.
On the other hand, both vegans and anti-vegans had a strong sense of private regard, meaning that they took pride in the views and practices of their own group.This sense of private regard did not differ between the two groups, however, it again likely derives from different sources.For vegans, a sense of in-group pride likely derives from their shared, core ethical values related to non-violence, the promotion of animal welfare, and the rejection of speciesism (Rosenfeld, 2019;Ruby, 2012).For anti-vegans, a sense of in-group pride may derive from a sense of camaraderie in the opposition to veganism and what they perceive as a moralistic or absolutist approach to eating (Gregson et al., 2022).
Our analysis of the dietarian identities of anti-vegans suggests that they share much in common with the profile of conscientious omnivores (Rothgerber, 2015).Anti-vegans were found to be more concerned with personal, prosocial, and moral aspects of food consumption, compared to omnivores.Furthermore, Gregson et al.'s (2022) analysis of anti-vegan discourse found, that similar to vegans, anti-vegans believe that humans should limit the suffering of animals in the production of food.Nonetheless, anti-vegans criticise vegans within this discourse for placing too much value on animal life (e.g., being "misanthropic") and for their absolute rejection of animal products.Hence, it would appear that both vegans and anti-vegans (at least relative to omnivores) are concerned with a conscientious approach to eating, however, the two groups differ in their beliefs about how conscientious diets are achieved possibly explained by their differing moral philosophies and stance towards speciesism.

Ideological profile of anti-vegans
The ideological profile of anti-vegans that emerges from this study reaffirms and advances what we know about antipathy towards meat avoiders.Previous work on vegan prejudice suggests that antipathy towards meat avoiders stems from the perceived symbolic threat that they pose to traditional, socio-cultural values (Dhont & Hodson, 2014;Dhont et al., 2016).As such, individuals who express negative attitudes towards meat avoiders are those who endorse traditional views on social hierarchy (Dhont et al., 2016) and human supremacy over animals (Leite et al., 2018).In the present research we found that anti-vegan identity was highly related to the perceived threat posed by veganism, and the endorsement of both social dominance and speciesism.Furthermore, part of the symbolic threat of meat avoiders is the way in which they challenge traditional gender norms-for example, the symbolic link between meat and masculinity (MacInnis & Hodson, 2017;Salmen & Dhont, 2022).Indeed, anti-vegans scored highest on male-role norm endorsement, which further supports the symbolic-threat account of vegan prejudice.
Our findings also provided confirmation of several inferences drawn from Gregson et al.'s (2022) study of online anti-vegan groups.Gregson et al. observed that anti-vegans frequented subreddits dedicated to dark humour, a predominantly male interest (Hofmann et al., 2020) underpinned by right-wing, conservative ideology (Hodson et al., 2010).We directly tested whether anti-vegans endorsed dark humour, and confirmed this to be the case, at rates above both omnivores and vegans.We also replicated the relationship between dark humour and SDO previously reported by Hodson et al. (2010).Consistent with theorising regarding dark humour as an expression of hegemonic masculinity (Plester, 2015), we observed links between dark humour and the endorsement of traditional male-gender roles.Gregson et al. (2022) observed discussion of several themes among anti-vegan redditors.One common theme involved morality, particularly the rejection of vegan arguments about the wrongness of killing animals for food and statements which appeared to endorse moral relativism (e.g., "everyone has different moral values there aren't a set of defined rules we must ad-hear to").In the present study, we directly tested whether anti-vegans have a more relativistic view of morality and confirmed this to be the case.This relativistic stance likely contributes to anti-vegans' (a) relaxed, non-prescriptive approach to eating, and (b) critical stance towards dietary out-groups (e.g., vegans) that moralise eating.Gregson et al. (2022) also observed themes related to scientific inquiry, whereby anti-vegans scrutinised and evidenced a distrust in the science on plant-based nutrition, which blended into discourse on adjacent topics (e.g., vaccination research).We found that anti-vegans were the least trusting of science, relative to both omnivores and vegans, and vegans had the highest levels of trust in science.We suspect that this distrust may be a by-product of their more "right-wing" profile.Indeed, some previous work (e.g., Kerr & Wilson, 2021) has shown that a SDO-conservative-values nexus correlates with distrust in science.
Looking at trust in the science on plant-based nutrition, we found that vegans held the greatest levels of trust.However, contrary to our original theorising, we found that anti-vegans trusted the science on plant-based nutrition more so than omnivores.This seemingly counterintuitive finding might be explained by several factors.A potential familiarity effect could be at play: previous literature suggests that antivegans are well versed in the scientific discourse around plant-forward diets, given the time they spend critiquing and discussing this literature (Aguilera-Carnerero & Carretero-González, 2021;Gregson et al., 2022).For each statement of the science on plant-based nutrition scale we made reference to research papers in the scientific literature (e.g., "The World Health Organisation, 2014").It is possible that anti-vegans, on the whole, are more familiar with the conventions of scientific literature than omnivores, having interrogated the science around plant-based eating more rigorously.As a result, they may be more likely to interpret the presence of citations as some indication of positive evidence for scientific claims.The items used to test trust in plant-based science were also fairly non-controversial and presented by the research team; a neutral source with no obvious "vegan agenda".Future research should consider whether this heightened trust in plant-based science, relative to omnivores, would replicate for more controversial claims or when presented by sources with an obvious pro-vegan stance.

Implications
The present research combines with earlier work on group-based anti-vegan discourse (e.g., Gregson et al., 2022) to highlight the importance of identity processes in the wider societal debate about sustainable diets.It also enriches the study of dietary change by providing an in-depth examination of a sub-population of omnivores R. Gregson et al. who display a unique dietarian and ideological profile.Current models of plant-forward eating transitions (e.g., Bryant et al., 2022) tend to emphasise three segments of the population, each requiring unique intervention strategies: pre-intenders (i.e., individuals lacking knowledge on the issue of plant-based eating and therefore have no intention to change), intenders (i.e., those informed on the issue, but who are not yet acting) and actors (i.e., those currently acting on their knowledge).The present line of investigation offers evidence of a fourth group: informed rejectorsi.e., individuals who are well informed about plant-forward diets yet reject the notion that behaviour change is necessary.Anti-vegans appear to be members of this fourth group, with whom the status of "informed rejector" (i.e., rejector of vegan ideology) plays a central role in their dietarian identity.
The dietarian and ideological profile of anti-vegans emerging in the current research offers novel insights to researchers and advocates concerned with plant-based eating.Advocacy, if directed at anti-vegans, should be tailored to their unique concerns and values, which differ in many ways from other omnivores.For example, given their relativistic meta-ethical stance and "flexible" (non-strict) approach to eating, strategies promoting absolutism or total abstention of animal products, as opposed to measured reduction, are likely to be met with strong criticism from this group.Furthermore, anti-vegans' greater distrust of science means that advocates should take care when drawing broad conclusions from nutrition science that could be read as "vegan bias".By contrast, anti-vegans' critical stance towards industrial agricultural systems (see Gregson et al., 2022) might be a useful starting point for building mutual understanding and initiatives.Finally, given the strong link between anti-vegan sentiment and dominance-related beliefs, general efforts to address hierarchical group-oriented attitudes are likely to have downstream implications for the adoption of plant-based diets, beyond the wider societal benefits of reducing intergroup conflict and prejudice (Dhont et al., 2016).

Limitations
We acknowledge that there are limitations on the generalisability of our samples.Our methods of recruitment differed for the anti-vegan sample, who were recruited through the means of social media, whereas vegan and omnivorous samples were recruited predominantly through the crowdsourcing platform, Prolific.It is possible that individuals recruited through social media systematically differ from crowdsourcing participants in significant ways, limiting the comparative conclusions we can draw regarding these populations.However, it should be pointed out that all participants received similar information about the study (that it was about "personality" and "eating habits") prior to giving their consent.Thus, selective participation, as a potential limitation, would apply equally to all three dietary groups.We also recognise that there was a slight difference in gender distributions across our three dietary groups, with vegans having a larger proportion of female-identified and agender/non-binary participants, relative to the omnivore samples.Though gender-identity is undeniably a relevant factor in research of this kind, we reiterate that the results reported here hold when comparing male-only participants (with slight divergences concerning diet centrality and prosocial motivations; see Supplements C).Last, we acknowledge the limits on establishing causal directions from our research: we cannot firmly establish whether the dietarian and ideological characteristics of anti-vegans are reasons for their antipathy towards vegans or whether their antipathy towards vegans is the reason for these characteristics.

Conclusion
Our investigation of the dietarian and ideological identities of "antivegan" individuals revealed numerous intra-group differences between anti-vegans and omnivores, as well as several inter-group similarities between anti-vegans and vegans.As a dietarian identity, being anti-vegan, like being vegan, is highly central to a person's sense of self.Like vegans, anti-vegans are also highly personally motivated, have low regard for other dietarian identities, and believe other groups perceive them quite negatively.These were all traits that anti-vegans and vegans exhibited to a greater extent than omnivores.Yet, in many ways, the profiles of vegans and anti-vegans differed.For instance, vegans were somewhat more morally motivated and had stricter eating habits.Analysis of the ideological underpinnings of anti-vegans helped account for these differences, as well as their strong opposition towards vegans.Anti-vegans endorsed a suite of values related to social aggression and dominance, traditional gender norms, and relativism as a moral philosophy.These characteristics stood in stark contrast to the more egalitarian, non-traditional, and non-relativistic stance of vegans, as well as the more moderate profile of non-antagonistic omnivores.Anti-vegans appear to be a subgroup of the population with a strong antimoralistic stance towards food, fuelled by a complex nexus of rightwing ideology, science scepticism, moral relativism and a pragmatic view of animal suffering.Future work should explore the pathways by which individuals come to identify as anti-vegan and how their ideological and intragroup commitments modulate their opposition towards veganism.

Table 1
Summary demographics by dietary group.
Correlational relationship between anti-vegan identification, veganism thread and key markers of individual difference.Notes.**correlation is significant at the 0.01 level, *correlation is significant at the 0.05 level.