Why do so many modern people hate insects? The urbanization-disgust hypothesis
Why do so many modern people hate insects? The urbanization-disgust hypothesis
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DOI：
10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.146229
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发表时间：
2021-03-12
影响因子：
9.8
通讯作者：
Soga, Masashi
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
Fukano, Yuya;Soga, Masashi
虽然对昆虫和其他陆生节肢动物（以下统称为“昆虫”）的负面看法在世界各地普遍存在，但这种现象的根本原因仍然未知。对昆虫的负面态度表现为厌恶情绪，这种情绪被认为是产生避病行为的一种心理适应。基于进化心理学的理论（厌恶的寄生虫回避理论和错误管理理论），我们假设城市化通过两种途径增加了人们对昆虫的厌恶感的强度和广度：（1）城市化增加了人们在室内看到昆虫的程度，并且在室内看到的昆虫比在室外看到的昆虫引起更强烈的厌恶感;（2）城市化减少了人们对昆虫的自然历史知识，知识的减少导致更广泛的昆虫引起厌恶感。为了验证我们的假设，我们在日本全国范围内进行了大规模的在线问卷调查和问卷实验（n = 13，000），以量化城市化水平、昆虫目击地点（室外/室内）、昆虫知识和受访者厌恶感之间的关系。我们的研究结果支持了这两种假设的途径，并表明过去避免病原体感染的进化压力所形成的心理机制可能是目前昆虫厌恶流行的基础，而城市化正在加强这一点。由于对自然的负面看法会降低保护自然的动力，因此持续的城市化加剧了对昆虫的负面态度，这对生物多样性构成了潜在的全球风险。(c)2021爱思唯尔有限公司版权所有。
While negative perceptions of insects and other terrestrial arthropods (hereafter referred to collectively as 'insects') are widespread around the world, the underlying causes of this phenomenon remain unknown. Negative attitudes towards insects manifest as the emotion disgust, which is regarded as a psychological adaptation to produce pathogen-avoidance behavior. Based on theories of evolutionary psychology (parasite avoidance theory of disgust and error management theory), we hypothesized that there are two pathways by which urbanization increases the intensity and breadth of feelings of disgust towards insects: (1) urbanization increases the extent to which people see insects indoors, and insects that are seen more often indoors induce stronger feelings of disgust than is induced by insects seen outdoors; and (2) urbanization reduces people's natural history knowledge about insects, and decreased knowledge results in a broader range of insects eliciting feelings of disgust. To test our hypothesis, we conducted a large-scale online questionnaire survey and questionnaire experiment (n = 13,000) across Japan to quantify the association between the level of urbanization, places of insect sightings (outdoor/ indoor), knowledge about insects, and respondents' feelings of disgust. Our results supported both hypothetical pathway and suggested that psychological mechanisms shaped by past evolutionary pressure to avoid pathogen infection may underlie the current prevalence of insect disgust, and this is being reinforced by urbanization. Because negative perceptions of nature can reduce motivation for its conservation, negative attitudes towards insects exacerbated by ongoing urbanization is a potential global risk for biodiversity. (c) 2021 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.