Happy but Vegetarian? Understanding the Relationship of Vegetarian Subjective Well-Being from the Nature-Connectedness Perspective of University Students

Vegetarianism constitutes not only a diet, but also a way of life and social movement currently in expansion worldwide. Since meat consumption negatively influences the environment, vegetarianism helps to preserve the health of ecosystems enhancing people's well-being. Yet vegetarians tend to experience lower subjective well-being. Potential reasons for this include social stigmatization, underlying mental conditions, or perception of the world as unfair. In this paper, we explore the possibility that vegetarians who feel connected to nature enjoy higher subjective well-being. To do so, we explore a sample comprising 1068 undergraduates and relate vegetarian commitment, accounting for vegetarian identity and vegetarian self-assessment scale, with connectedness to nature for three different measures of subjective well-being, life satisfaction, emotional well-being, and subjective vitality. We find that vegetarian subjective well-being is better understood through individuals' connection with the environment. Our results suggest that connectedness to nature is positively related, and vegetarian commitment generally associates negatively to subjective well-being except for vegans who have greater emotional well-being and vitality than other food identities. However, vegans experience greater life satisfaction while highly connected to nature. Lacto-pesco and lacto-ovo vegetarians also enjoy greater emotional well-being and vitality, respectively, while highly connected to nature. Considering vegetarian scale, individuals rating higher experience increased subjective vitality when highly connected to nature. Therefore, we propose that further policy developments in the area should consider the role of connectedness to nature in order to achieve higher levels of subjective well-being, while actively promoting pro-environmental behaviors such as vegetarianism.

Automated summary

Vegetarianism is a growing global social movement that helps protect the environment and enhance people's well-being, although vegetarians often experience lower subjective well-being. Research suggests that a strong connection to nature can increase subjective well-being among vegetarians, and the well-being of vegetarians is better understood through their relationship with the environment.