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Hope, gratitude, fear, and disgust may all be key to encouraging preventative action in the context of COVID-19. We pre-registered a longitudinal experiment, which involved monthly data collections from September 2020 to September 2021 and a six-month follow-up. We predicted that a hope recall task would reduce negative emotions and elicit higher intentions to engage in COVID-19 preventative behaviours. At the first time point, participants were randomly allocated to a recall task condition (gratitude, hope, or control). At each time point, we measured willingness to engage in COVID-19 preventative behaviours, as well as experienced hope, gratitude, fear, and disgust. We then conducted a separate, follow-up study in February 2022, to see if the effects replicated when COVID-19 restrictions were relaxed in the UK. In the main study, contrary to our pre-registered hypothesis, we found that a gratitude recall task elicited more willingness to engage in COVID-19 preventative behaviours in comparison to the neutral recall task. We also found that experienced gratitude, hope, and fear were positively related to preventative action, while disgust was negatively related. These results present advancement of knowledge of the role of specific emotions in the COVID-19 pandemic.

The present study examined mother-child talk about disgust. A total of 68 mothers and their 4-, ( M age = 55.72 months, SD = 4.13), 6- ( M age = 100.90 months, SD = 4.61) year-old children discussed four tasks relating to moral and pathogen disgust. Tasks comprised labeling facial expressions of emotions, generating items that would make participants disgusted or angry, identifying moral and pathogen transgressions as either causing anger or disgust, and finally rating the degree to which moral and pathogen transgressions were disgusting and justifying their responses. Mother-child dyads recognized the facial expression of happiness more accurately than that of disgust, but disgust was recognized equally well as expressions of sadness and anger across all age groups. Dyads associated moral transgressions with anger, whereas they associated pathogen transgressions with disgust. Finally, mothers and children and mothers individually rated pathogen transgressions as more disgusting than moral transgressions. Taken together, findings show that moral disgust is understood at a later age and is only used metaphorically, if at all, in children as old as 8 years old. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).SD = 5.45), and 8- ( M age = 100.90 months, SD = 4.61) year-old children discussed four tasks relating to moral and pathogen disgust. Tasks comprised labeling facial expressions of emotions, generating items that would make participants disgusted or angry, identifying moral and pathogen transgressions as either causing anger or disgust, and finally rating the degree to which moral and pathogen transgressions were disgusting and justifying their responses. Mother-child dyads recognized the facial expression of happiness more accurately than that of disgust, but disgust was recognized equally well as expressions of sadness and anger across all age groups. Dyads associated moral transgressions with anger, whereas they associated pathogen transgressions with disgust. Finally, mothers and children and mothers individually rated pathogen transgressions as more disgusting than moral transgressions. Taken together, findings show that moral disgust is understood at a later age and is only used metaphorically, if at all, in children as old as 8 years old. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

Anger and disgust may have distinct roles in sexual morality; here, we tested hypotheses regarding the distinct foci, appraisals, and motivations of anger and disgust within the context of sexual offenses. We conducted four experiments in which we manipulated whether mutual consent (Studies 1–3) or desire (Study 4) was present or absent within a counter-normative sexual act. We found that anger is focused on the injustice of non-consensual sexual acts, and the transgressor of the injustice (Studies 1 and 3). Furthermore, the sexual nature of the act was not critical for the elicitation of anger—as anger also responded to unjust acts of violence (Study 3). By contrast, we hypothesised and found that disgust is focused on whether or not a person voluntarily engaged in, desired or consented to a counter-normative sexual act (Studies 2–4). Appraisals of abnormality and degradation were the primary appraisals of disgust, and the sexual nature of the act was a critical elicitor of disgust (Study 3). A final study ruled out victimisation as the mechanism of the effect of consent on disgust and indicated that the consenter's sexual desire was the mechanism (Study 4). Our results reveal that anger and disgust have differential roles in consent-related sexual offenses due to the distinct appraisals and foci of these emotions. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

With the recent upswing in research interest on the moral implications of disgust, there has been uncertainty about what kind of situations elicit moral disgust and whether disgust is a rational or irrational player in moral decision making. We first outline the benefits of distinguishing between bodily violations (e.g., sexual taboos, such as pedopbilia and incest) and nonbodily violations (e.g., deception or betrayal) when examining moral disgust. We review findings from our lab and others' showing that, although many existing studies do not control for anger when studying disgust, disgust at nonbodily violations is often associated with anger and hard to separate from it, while bodily violations more consistently predict disgust independently of anger. Building on this distinction, we present further empirical evidence that moral disgust, in the context of bodily violations, is a relatively primitively appraised moral emotion compared to others such as anger, and also that it is less flexible and less prone to external justifications. Our review and results underscore the need to distinguish between the different consequences of moral emotions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Moral concern was found to be an additional influence on insect consumption. • Exposure to others consuming insects does not impact one's own willingness. • Exposure to others consuming insects reduces disgust and increases acceptability. • However, exposure only impacts beliefs under very specific circumstances. Disgust, social influence, and moral concern seem to play a pivotal role in insect consumption. Research examining these factors, particularly in the UK, is currently lacking. As a result, two studies were conducted to examine the perceived barriers and benefits of insect consumption, and how disgust can be counteracted. First, a cross-sectional study (N = 600) showed that disgust and moral concerns were unique predictors of individual's willingness to consume insect products. Second, we conducted an experiment (N = 519) to examine whether knowledge that someone else consumes an insect-based product impacts one's own willingness to consume insects. In this study we replicated Hartmann, Ruby, Schmidt, and Siegrist (2018) methodology of giving information about an insect consumer but added details about the individuals' occupation and what type of product they consumed, examining how these factors impacted individual's willingness to consume insect-based products. We found that this information did not impact willingness to consume; however, it did influence feelings of disgust and perceived acceptability. This study also replicated the first study by demonstrating that disgust and moral concern are barriers to insect consumption. We hope the current findings trigger future research to examine how disgust can be counteracted, and to better understand the role of moral concern in insect consumption. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Anger is typically thought to be an emotion that is associated with negative outcomes, such as aggression; however, evidence shows that anger can be related to positive outcomes as well, such as making amends and reparations. Two studies examined the role of anger, contempt, and disgust on behavioural tendencies (i.e., reparative action, avoidance versus aggression) in two contexts: romantic relationships (Study 1) and friendships (Study 2). We also tested whether various individual differences may impact these relationships. It was found that anger was associated with reparative action in both contexts and disgust was related to less reparative action in friendships. All three emotions were positively connected to aggression in romantic relationships (Study 1), but only disgust was related to aggression in friendships (Study 2). Disgust was positively related to avoidance in both studies. The results suggest that anger is an approach emotion, being consistently associated with the positive outcome of reparative action, and disgust is more consistently related to behavioural tendencies in close relationships than contempt. Future research should endeavour to examine when and how the positive behavioural effects of anger can be fostered in close relationships. • Anger predicted reparative action and aggression in close relationships. • Disgust predicted avoidance and aggression in close relationships. • Disgust is a more consistent predictor of behaviour than contempt. • Trait emotions showed different relationships with behaviour than state emotions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]