Development of the attitudes toward vegetarians scale

Studies have explored the motivations behind the decision to become vegetarian, and have explored the well being of vegetarians. However, little research has focused on the social psychological and interpersonal aspects of vegetarianism. The focus of this study was to develop a scale designed to measure attitudes toward vegetarians (ATVS). This scale measures a one-factor construct with adequate internal consistency. The ATVS correlated significantly with the construct of authoritarianism, and, as expected, the ATVS did not correlate significantly with social desirability. In addition, attitudes toward vegetarians were found to be generally positive. The positive attitudes toward vegetarians may be the result of using a college student population that was overwhelmingly female. (C) 2002 International Society for Anthrozoology.