Meat consumption is a major contributor to global warming. Given the worldwide growing demand of meat, and the severe impact of meat production on the planet, reducing animal protein consumption is a matter of food security and public health. Changing consumer food behavior is a challenge. Taste preferences, culinary traditions and social norms factor into food choices. Since behavioral change cannot occur without the subject’s positive attitude based on reasons and motivations, a total of 34 papers on consumer attitudes and behavior towards meat consumption in relation to environmental concerns were examined. The results show that consumers aware of the meat impact on the planet, willing to stop or significantly reduce meat consumption for environmental reasons, and who have already changed their meat intake for ecological concerns are a small minority. However, environmental motives are already appealing significant proportions of Westerners to adopt certain meat curtailment strategies. Those who limit meat intake for environmental reasons are typically female, young, simply meat-reducer (not vegan/vegetarian), ecology-oriented, and would more likely live in Europe and Asia than in the U.S.

Meat-based diets are the norm in Western societies. This is a problem because meat production is a major contributor to global warming and environmental degradation. Despite the urgency to reduce meat consumption, quantitative studies have shown that there is only a small minority of consumers aware of the meat environmental impact, willing to halt or reduce meat intake for ecological reasons, or who have already stopped or reduced meat consumption because of environmental concerns. We conducted a qualitative synthesis reviewing studies that looked at attitudes towards changing meat consumption. Our focus was on the behavioral change process: Awareness, willingness, and change, aiming to enhance the current understanding of people’s attitudes towards reducing meat consumption due to environmental concerns. The studies reviewed show that consumer awareness is hindered by beliefs about food, meat, and personal behavior. Nutrition, health, and taste were found to be both enablers and barriers with regard to willingness. Vegetarians and vegans perceive the environment as simply another reason, among others, to maintain a meatless diet. Based on these results, we offer recommendations for future dietary public health interventions, and for future research endeavors on this topic. This review employed a meta-aggregative approach and partially followed the Joanna Briggs Institute methodology for systematic reviews of qualitative evidence.

Planetary and human health depend on Westerners’ ability to reduce meat consumption. Meat production degrades the environment while excessive meat intake is associated with cancer and cardiovascular disease, among others. Effective reasons and motivations are needed for consumers to change their diet. The fact that modern animal agriculture inflicts a great deal of pain on animals from their birth to their slaughter, animal welfare/suffering may drive consumers to curtail their meat consumption. This systematic review examined a total of 90 papers to ascertain consumers’ awareness of the pain animals experience in animal agriculture, as well as consumer attitudes towards meat reduction due to animal welfare. Results show that consumers have low awareness of animal agriculture. Awareness of animal agricultural practices and animal sentience is associated with increased negative attitudes towards animal suffering. Animal suffering due to farming practices, transportation, slaughter, and animal sentience are factors that may encourage a reduction in meat consumption, and even dietary change in the short term. There is also evidence that animal suffering may be a more compelling motivation for consumers’ willingness to change their diet than for health or environmental reasons. Therefore, increasing consumers’ awareness of animal suffering in meat production is paramount to contributing to reduced pressure on the environment and improved human health.

Ten years ago National Geographic magazine reported that the Loma Linda Seventh-day Adventist population is one of the communities in the world that lives longer and with a higher quality of life thanks in part to the biological benefits of a vegetarian diet. Along with National Geographic, other media outlets have reported since then that the Adventist religious community considers a plant-based diet a very important factor for a healthy lifestyle. Adventists have been promoting this type of diet worldwide for more than 150 years. This article is an attempt to understand from a social-scientific perspective the origin of the importance they lend to diet and see whether this helps explain why approximately 150 years after the founding of the church, diet remains crucial for Adventists around the world. The conclusion proposed is that Adventists understood the adoption of a plant-based diet as a special divine instruction in order to nourish their new identity as a special people differentiated from the rest of society. This was possible through a desecularisation of diet that placed food in the moral category of the Adventist belief system.Keywords: Seventh-day Adventist Church; vegetarian diet; religion; health; desecularisation; identity

Chile has a serious public health problem due to the high prevalence of both unhealthy dietary patterns and mental illnesses. Given that dietary quality is positively associated with the quality of mental health, it is urgent that healthy dietary patterns be promoted among Chileans. The WHO recommends the use of mass media for the dissemination of knowledge about mental health. Since health news affect people’s attitudes and health behaviors, this study analyzed the coverage by three Chilean online newspapers with the largest readership regarding the relation between diet and mental health in 2016. A previously constructed corpus of 2551 news items about food was analyzed quantitatively. The results show that the relevance of the topic diet and mental health was low in all three newspapers. The most frequent type of information was on “foods” and not “nutrients” that “benefit”—not that “damage”—mental health. The quality of the news was poor as a narrow range of sources was found. An individual responsibility frame predominated in the information to the detriment of a public health frame.

Revista Latina de Comunicacion Social, RLCS, es una revista cient?fica editada en la Universidad de La Laguna, ULL (Tenerife, Islas Canarias) en el LAboratorio de Tecnolog?as de la Informacion y Nuevos An?lisis de Comunicacion, LATINA, fundada en 1987 por el Dr. Jos? Manuel de Pablos Coello, al amparo de los programas especiales de doctorado para profesores latinoamericanos. Publica exclusivamente bajo el sumario principal trabajos de investigacion, redactados siguiendo la formula IMRyDC+B: introduccion, metodolog?a, resultados y discusion m?s conclusiones, con una bibliograf?a actualizada: un m?nimo del 70 % de las entradas han de ser de los ?ltimos 10 a?os y la mitad de ellas de revistas cient?ficas. Los revisores hacen un estudio por pares y 'ciego'. Se trata de un proyecto colectivo e interuniversitario, con numerosos docentes e investigadores de casi todos los pa?ses de habla espa?ola y portuguesa. RLCS es uno de los tres journals de Comunicacio;n espa?oles situados en el segundo cuartil de GSC, Google Scholar Metrics, con un ?ndice H de 9 (noviembre de 2012), que ya era de 12 en febrero de 2013. La revista est? en los bancos de datos EBSCO (Estados Unidos), DOAJ (Lund University, Suecia), Redalyc (M?xico), Dialnet (Espa?a) y se halla indizada por el CINDOC -CSIC en DICE, ISOC, RESH, Oficina de Educacion Iberoamericana, OEI; Dulcinea... Y en 2011, en Scopus. En Espa?a es revista-fuente o de referencia, en el Directorio de Revistas Espa?olas de Ciencias Sociales / Comunicacion, IN-RECS, de la Universidad de Granada, UGR. Ocupa la primera posicion en el ?ndice acumulativo del periodo 2003 - 2007; id. 2004-2008; id. 2005-2009 y de los a?os 2008, 2009 y 2010. En el factor de impacto de revistas espa?olas de Comunicacio;n (In RECS) de 2011 volvio; a estar en el primer cuartil, lo que suced?a por cuarto a?o consecutivo. En Google Scholar (2012) figura en el segundo cuartil, con ?ndice H histo;rico de 15 y un ?ndice H5 de 13. Incluida en el top 100 de revistas en castellano de Google Scholar Revista Latina de Comunicacion Social, RLCS, is a scientific journal edited at the University of La Laguna, ULL (Tenerife, Canary Islands) in the Laboratory of Information Technologies and New Analysis of Communication, LATINA according to its initials in Spanish, founded in 1987 by Dr. Jos? Manuel de-Pablos-Coello, under the protection of special doctorate programmes for Latin American professors. The journal publishes under the main summary almost exclusively research papers written following the formula IMR&DC+B: introduction, methodology, results and discussion plus conclusion, with a updated bibliography: at least 70% of the bibliographic entries must be from the past 10 years and half of them from scientific journals in Spanish and English languages. Reviewers make a double blind peer examination. This is a collective and inter-university project, including many professors and researchers from almost all Spanish and Portuguese speaking countries. RLCS is one of the three Spanish-language journals of communication that are located in second quartile of the GSC, Google Scholar Metrics, with an h-index of 9 (November 2012), which had already increased to 12 by February 2013.The journal is the following databases: SCOPUS, EBSCO (USA), DOAJ (Lund University, Sweden), Redalyc (Mexico), Dialnet (Spain); and is indexed by the CINDOC-CSIC in DICE, ISOC, RESH, Office of Latin American Education, OEI according to its initials in Spanish; Dulcinea... and at 2011, in Scopus. In Spain the journal is a reference in the Directory of Index of Spanish Periodicals of Social and Communication Sciences, IN-RECS, of the University of Granada, UGR. RLCS occupies the first position in the cumulative index for the periods 2003-2007; 2004-2008, 2005-2009 and the years 2008. 2009 and 2010. For the fourth consecutive year, in 2011 RLCS was positioned in the top quartile of the Impact Factor Index of the Spanish Journals of Communication (In RECS). In 2012, when Google Scholar Metrics (GSM), the international journal ranking system, was launched, the RLCS positioned itself in the second quartile?(Q2), position 90, of the world?s most-cited communication journals, with an h5-index of 9, which increased to 13 in February 2013, when its global h-index was 15. Included in the top 100 of journals in Google Scholar's Spanish language