Stimulating Sustainable Food Choices Using Virtual Reality: Taking an Environmental vs Health Communication Perspective on Enhancing Response Efficacy Beliefs
Meijers,Marijn H.C. Smit,Eline S. de Wildt,Kelly Karvonen,Sonja Greetta van der Plas,Demi van der Laan,L. Nynke
Meijers,Marijn H.C.
Smit,Eline S.
de Wildt,Kelly
Karvonen,Sonja Greetta
van der Plas,Demi
van der Laan,L. Nynke
Abstract
Personal response efficacy beliefs are vital in instigating, maintaining, and catalyzing environmental behavior change. In this experimental study (N = 249), we investigated whether such efficacy beliefs could be stimulated using Virtual Reality. In a VR-supermarket, participants would see interactive pop-ups displaying impact messages when they picked up products, these are messages that display the (environmental or health) impact of a product. Our results show that these impact messages are effective in stimulating personal response efficacy beliefs and subsequently pro-environmental food choices. The heightened personal response efficacy beliefs positively affected maintaining and catalyzing behavior change (i.e. positive spill-over) up to two weeks after the VR-experience. The effectiveness of the impact messages did not depend on appeal type (health vs environmental appeal) or modality (text + visual vs text only) of the message. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.
Description
Funding Information: The research was supported by a Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research grant awarded to the first [grant number Veni.201S.075] and second author [grant number 451-15-028] and an ASCoR (Amsterdam School of Communication Research) grant. The authors would like to thank Eline Jansen for her help in conducting the study and two anonymous reviewers for their helpful and constructive feedback. Publisher Copyright: © 2021 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
Date
2022-01-02
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Research Projects
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Keywords
behavior change, environment, experiment, health, Virtual reality
Citation
Meijers, M H C, Smit, E S, de Wildt, K, Karvonen, S G, van der Plas, D & van der Laan, L N 2022, 'Stimulating Sustainable Food Choices Using Virtual Reality : Taking an Environmental vs Health Communication Perspective on Enhancing Response Efficacy Beliefs', Environmental Communication, vol. 16, no. 1, pp. 1-22. https://doi.org/10.1080/17524032.2021.1943700