In the work presented, we use an incentivized consumption measure to assess the behavioral impacts of watching a roughly 15-minute video about industrial-scale pork production (clipped from the Dominion documentary). They find, provisionally (based on data collected thus far), that the demand for meat-containing meals decreases by 26.4% immediately after watching the video and by 12.2% at a one-week follow-up. The video appears to have a particularly large impact on the demand for pork, with immediate and one-week decreases of 48.5 and 26.2 percent, respectively. We observe (smaller yet still significant) decreases in the demand for other meat products, with immediate and one-week reductions of 22.8 and 9.8 percent, suggesting that information about industrial-scale pork production can affect preferences for other types of meat as well.

Overall, our video appears to be quite effective in promoting plant-based eating when comparing the observed effects on demand to the effects of other videos tested in the literature. As we discuss, there are some unique characteristics of our video (relative to those used in previous studies) and of our primary consumption measure that may contribute to this discrepancy. Even so, the relatively low baseline popularity of pork (compared to other meats) in our sample suggests that the video’s impact may have been constrained by its focus on pork, raising the possibility that a broader portrayal of industrial meat production could be even more effective in promoting plant-based eating.

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Peter Landry is an Associate Professor of Marketing at the University of Toronto, Mississauga, and is cross-appointed to the Marketing Area at the Rotman School of Management. His research explores the effects of limited attention and perception on decision-making in a variety of market settings. Before coming to the University of Toronto, Peter received his PhD in Economics from Duke University, and then spent one year as a postdoctoral researcher at the California Institute of Technology.

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This seminar is part of an ongoing series hosted by the Humane & Sustainable Food Lab at Stanford.