To eat or not to eat meat - The role of social influence, identity and social network on individual's dietary choice

该项目将调查社会互动、身份认同和网络对人们吃肉行为的作用。现在有一个广泛的共识，即过度食用肉类与增加健康风险和环境破坏有关。最近，我们观察到越来越多的人决定减少肉类消费或完全停止吃肉。这一趋势尤其强烈，尤其是在年轻人中，社交媒体可能对他们有很大的影响。该项目将调查社会影响力和社交网络如何影响人们吃肉或不吃肉的决定。社会影响既可以通过现实生活中的网络(如家庭或工作网络)发生，也可以通过虚拟社交媒体网络发生。该项目将与素食协会(VegSoc)合作，后者非常有兴趣了解现有数据告诉我们，近年来人们成为素食主义者或素食主义者的动机是什么。研究人员将与VegSoc密切合作，确定影响人们决定吃肉和不吃肉的关键问题，并为未来调查问卷的设计提供信息。该项目由两个主要部分组成。首先，它将调查现有数据，以解决关于人们吃肉行为的实证研究问题。其次，它将开发一个基于代理的模拟模型，以研究社会影响和社会网络对采用素食或纯素食饮食的影响。基于第一部分的经验发现，基于代理的模型将被用来研究吃肉行为如何通过不同的机制在不同的人群中传播，例如同龄人的压力。该模型还将用来解释一些观察到的社会现象，如人口中吃肉行为的聚集和两极分化，并加深我们对素食在人们中传播的社会动力的理解。

The project will investigate the role of social interactions, identity and network on people's meat-eating behaviour. There is a wide consensus now that excessive meat consumption is linked to increased health risks and environmental damage. More recently, we observe an increasing trend of people who decide to reduce meat consumption or stop eating meat altogether. The trend is strong especially among young people, on whom social media may have a big influence. The project will investigate how social influence and social network affect people's decision to eat or not eat meat. Social influence can take place both via the real-life network such as family or work network, as well as via the virtual social media network. The project will partner with the Vegetarian Society (VegSoc), which is very interested in learning what existing data tell us about people's motivations to become vegetarians or vegans in recent years. Researchers will work closely with VegSoc to identify the key issues that affect people's decision to eat and not eat meat, and to inform the design of future questionnaires. Support will be in-kind only.The project consists of two main components. First, it will investigate existing data to address empirical research questions on people's meat-eating behaviour. Second, it will develop an agent-based simulation model to study the impact of social influence and social network on the adoption of the vegetarian or vegan diet. Based on empirical findings from the first component, the agent-based model will be used to investigate how meat-eating behaviours can spread among different people groups through different mechanisms such as peer pressure. The model will also be used to explain some observed social phenomenon, such as the clustering and polarisation of meat-eating behaviour in the population, and deepen our understanding of the social dynamics in the spread of vegetarian diet among people.