Test tube meat and psychology

Eat schnitzel – without remorse

Schnitzel essen – so geht es ohne Reue Kathrin Burger, Der Spiegel

Translation: Inopressa

"Meat from the lab? Many people are disgusted by this idea," the German magazine writes Der Spiegel.

"Tomorrow, meat production may look like this: several chickens, pigs and cows are kept on a common farm. They are no longer killed – they are only donors of muscle tissue stem cells. Real meat is made from them in the laboratory, with the same nutrients as in ordinary meat, and with the same taste. Eating without remorse is the idea of meat production in the laboratory," says journalist Katrin Burger.

But who will eat artificial meat at all? "In the issue of test tube meat, the aversion factor already plays a very important role," says Silvia Voll, a researcher at the Institute for Technology Assessment and System Analysis at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology. As part of one of the projects, she conducted a survey among citizens and experts about their attitude to meat grown in the laboratory. "Most consumers found it disgusting," says the researcher.

"Peter Slade, a researcher at the University of Saskatchewan, recently revealed that only 11% of research participants would buy a burger with meat from a test tube at the same price and the same taste, while 65% would prefer a regular burger, and 21% would eat a vegetarian burger," the article says.

Scientists, the publication continues, call this neophobia and see the reason that aversion to unfamiliar food once protected Homo sapiens from poisoning. "Animal products are more likely to cause a feeling of disgust than vegetable products. And this, in turn, is one of the reasons why meat from a test tube is rejected more than meat substitutes from vegetable ingredients," says Michael Siegrist, who studies consumer behavior at the Swiss Higher Technical School of Zurich.

The feeling of rejection is largely related to culture and upbringing. So, in Europe, insects are not considered appetizing, while in Asia, the larvae of flour crunch and grasshoppers are often delicacies, Der Spiegel notes.

"In order to increase the recognition of test tube meat by society, it is not necessary to describe in detail the technology of its production. It should be emphasized that this is meat that is simply produced in a different way," Zygrist believes. "As a study by Christopher Bryant, a psychologist at the University of Bath, has shown, the name also plays a role. "Pure meat" or "meat without animals" were perceived by people more positively than "meat grown in the laboratory" (...)," the publication reports.

According to a study conducted by Voll, people's attitude to meat from a test tube also changes after the study participants are familiar with the potential benefits of meat from a test tube. At the same time, there are types of consumers who are easier to convince. "So, men are more tolerant of unfamiliar food than women, and disgust grows with age. This also applies to artificial meat. It is not surprising that vegetarians are more open to it. (...) Meat grown in the laboratory is treated differently in different cultures, as shown by Bryant's study, which was attended by more than 3 thousand people from the United States, China and India. Interestingly, in India and China, there were significantly fewer prejudices against the new method of meat production than in the United States."

The study also showed that in India and the United States, people who adhere to leftist or liberal views are ready to try alternative meat first of all. The scientist attributes this to the fact that people with left-wing political views focus less attention on traditions.

"However, the biggest obstacle to the introduction of meat grown in the laboratory is, first of all, the idea of naturalness. "Artificiality is accepted in relation to medicine, while food should be natural, real and authentic," says Siegrist. Scientists consider this paradoxical, because "cola, cheese products or strawberry flavor in yogurt are also created artificially."

"So far, meat from a test tube is not sold in stores, but soon steaks made in the laboratory will be ready to enter the market," Der Spiegel writes in conclusion. The developers are still struggling with some technical issues. In addition, it is unclear whether its large-scale production consumes less energy than conventional meat production. The topic of animal treatment is also ambiguous, since it is not known how painful muscle biopsy is for them, with the help of which it is planned to obtain stem cells. "Only when the benefits are really proven and mass production becomes possible, (...) the designation "clean meat" will be justified," says Voll.

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