Don't Judge a Food by Its Package: Greenwashing Alters Health Perceptions
Description
Past research has shown that “greenwashed” package designs promote the belief that a product is environmentally friendly. The present investigation tested whether greenwashing influences the perceived health benefits of food items. In each condition, participants completed a computer-based survey in which they were shown an image of each of the six food items and asked to indicate how healthy they perceived the food product to be (1 = extremely unhealthy; 7 = extremely healthy). Once they completed these ratings, as essentially a manipulation check, participants responded to the same food items but were now asked to rate how environmentally friendly they perceived the product to be (1 = not environmentally friendly at all; 7 = extremely environmentally friendly). In Study 1 (N = 84), participants generally perceived greenwashed foods to be healthier than did participants evaluating comparable foods in conventional packages. Study 2 (N = 76) additionally compared the impact of a label indicating “organic.” Results showed that for food items generally perceived as healthier, both greenwashed and organic products were rated as significantly healthier than conventionally labeled food products; for foods perceived as less healthy, only the greenwashed items were considered to be healthier, whereas for items generally considered to be unhealthy, package labeling did not exert a significant effect on health perceptions.