Your disgust system has a bit of a psychological reflex quality to it, and there are ways in which it isn’t at the immediate or direct behest of your conscious will. So, for instance, I don’t think I could sit here and simply decide that from here on out, I’m going to be disgusted by ketchup, or introspect for a bit and just recalibrate by own capacity to be disgusted so that from now on I’ll feel revolted by the sight of some particular corporate logo.

That said, there are more roundabout ways to sort of install, for a lack of a better word, a new disgust trigger in your own mind. You might use a strategy of “fake it ‘til you make it,” and *act* disgusted every time you come across ketchup. There’s reason to think that by deliberately doing things like making an exaggerated grossed out facial expression, you can actually induce a mild flash of disgust in yourself. Keep telling yourself how disgusting ketchup is, deliberately make that yuck face every time you come across it, and eventually ketchup could come to automatically trigger the reflex like emotional response, without your having to think about it or voluntarily act it out anymore.

Disgust is pretty sensitive to social influence, too, so you might enlist other people to help direct and refine your own revulsion. If you’ve heard enough bad things about Corporation X that you want the company, even the mere sight of its logo, to disgust you, you might decide to do things like read vivid descriptions of the most egregious sins of Corporation X, surround yourself with others who are avidly opposed to Corporation X, and take part in their fervent protests. Again, given enough time and exposure, you could “catch” a disgust trigger from your passionate peers.

Daniel Kelly is a professor of philosophy at Purdue University and the author of the new book Yuck! The Nature and Moral Significance of Disgust.