The effect of implicit theories of beauty on the purchasing intention of ugly food

Abstract

This research aims to understand ifimplicit theories of beauty(incremental belief-beauty is something malleable -vs entity belief -beauty is something fixed) can alter the purchasing intentions of ugly food -that is food that has an unusual shape or colour and thatfrequently ends up going to waste. It was predicted that an entity theoristwould purchase less ugly food than an incremental theorist, as the former aims at self-signalling himself, while the latter would be more focusedon the process and the ways to self-improve. As a result, beauty incremental theorists werelikely to have a lower bias towards performance according to the aesthetic(negative aesthetic effect)compared to entity theorists.An experiment in which implicit theories of beauty was manipulated was conducted to test this prediction. Data analyses included an A NOVA and ANCOVA. Nevertheless, no relationship was found between implicit theories of beauty and purchasing intentions of ugly food, as well as, no connection was found between implicit theories of beauty and the negative aesthetic effect. Finally, the limitations and possible justifications for the result of this study were underlined, as well as, what future research can be developed.