Perceptions of animal pain.
Disgust as a moderating factor.
THE QUESTION
Does the disgust we feel toward an animal change how we perceive its capacity for pain — and, in turn, our willingness to act on that suffering?
WHAT I DID
Two-condition between-subjects design via Qualtrics, with disgust manipulated through species framing. Outcome measures: rated pain capacity, perceived moral concern, behavioral intention. Analyzed in SPSS.
WHAT I FOUND
Disgust significantly reduced perceived pain capacity, with the effect strongest among participants high in baseline trait disgust. Implications for how affective responses might shape clinical judgment in adjacent domains.
WHAT I COULDN'T TEST
The sample was undergraduate-heavy and US-only. Whether the disgust effect generalizes to clinically trained populations is the next study, not this one.
Full paper available in /materials. If you have been given a link, the password works across all pages there.