Understanding meat consumption in later life: A segmentation of older consumers in the EU

Protein intake is important for the maintenance of health, independence, and quality of life especially for older adults, yet the expanding older population is at risk of not consuming adequate levels. Notwithstanding its importance in terms of health, dietary protein choice has major ramifications for the state of the environment and for climate change, with meat holding the most weight in the environmental impact of diets. To support older consumers in making environmentally sustainable dietary protein choices, this study aims to gain deeper understanding of older consumers’ meat consumption behavior by profiling older consumer segments on the basis of their meat consumption and liking. Results were obtained through a 2019-survey among 2,500 community-dwelling older adults aged 65 years or above in Finland, Poland, Spain, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom. Three segments of older consumers were identified by means of a two-step cluster analysis: heavy meat consumers, medium meat consumers, and light meat consumers. The segments differed significantly in several socio-demographics and background characteristics, appetite, protein intake, attitudes towards meat and plant-based ‘meat’ substitutes, and liking of protein sources other than meat. Health and sustainability food choice motives were important determinants for being classified as a medium or light meat consumer compared to a heavy meat consumer whereas food fussiness, sensory appeal, and familiarity were important determinants for being classified as a heavy meat consumer compared to a light meat consumer. Understanding older consumers’ meat consumption behavior has important implications for designing dietary strategies to meet older consumers’ protein needs in an environmentally sustainable way.     

Perception of fashion sustainability in online community

The issue of sustainability is crucial in fashion business and has received considerable attentions from the consumers. In this paper, we investigate the change in people’s concerns on sustainable fashion by using secondary data collected from two major online fashion forums from 2004 to 2012. Our analysis is taken by a cross-time approach and the results reflect that forum discussions over sustainable fashion have changed over time. While topics on sustainable production and remanufacturing, green information sharing, and green attitude and education once received heated discussions in the mid-2000s, green marketing has become the main focus lately. Our results imply that provision of green information by fashion retailers is a way to educate consumers and improve their awareness in the importance of sustainability. It is also beneficial to stimulate consumers’ purchase decision of sustainable fashion. The findings provide industry insights for practitioners to better develop and promote sustainable fashion.     

Decreasing consumers’ risk perception of food additives by knowledge enhancement in China

Food safety issues have occurred frequently in China in recent years, which results in consumers’ high risk perception of food additives. In the present research, we examined whether knowledge would decrease Chinese consumers’ risk perception of food additives under the influence of food safety issues’ risk perception; we also investigated how information selection impacted popularization effectiveness. Study 1 demonstrated that risk perception of food safety issues was positively correlated with risk perception of food additives. In addition, with increased risk perception of food safety issues, the higher level of knowledge weakened the influence of risk perception of food safety issues on risk perception of food additives. In Study 2, we proposed a consumer-risk-focused approach of knowledge popularization related to food additives, based on consumers’ cognitive rules and concerns. We compared its popularization effectiveness with the comprehensive-knowledge-based approach at three time points. We found that the consumer-risk-focused approach significantly promoted the effectiveness of popularization, including increasing knowledge accuracy and trust, and decreasing risk perception. The present study provides evidence that risk perception of food safety issues leads to biased judgments and perceptions concerning food additives, but knowledge acts as a buffering function in this biased relationship. In addition, in terms of practical application, this study contributes to improving the effectiveness of knowledge popularization about food additives.     

Consumer understanding of sustainability concept in agricultural products

The term “sustainability” is based on three main pillars: environment, society and economy. To achieve sustainable development, agriculture is one of the main fields to be considered and it is key to address economic, environmental and ethical problems. Besides, consumers are increasingly demanding foods produced under sustainable practices and aiming to get involved in the process of enhancing food sustainability. Under such premises, a study was carried out with more than 3600 consumers in 6 countries (Brazil, China, India, Mexico, Spain and USA). Participants were asked questions organized in two main topics: general sustainability and willingness to pay on different food categories. In general, results showed that consumers thought that a sustainable product is “environmentally friendly”, “healthier”, has been grown using “few chemicals” and “have better quality”. More than 30% of consumers in the US and Spain were not willing to pay more for sustainable products. This percentage decreased to 20% in China, Mexico and Brazil and reached the lowest value in India (~14%). The main conclusion is that consumers are not fully aware of the importance of sustainability; in general, consumers tend to associate sustainable production with just organic farming and higher quality.     

Exploring consumers’ perceptions of plant-based eggs using concept mapping and semantic network analysis

Plant-based eggs offer a healthy, animal-free, and more environmentally sustainable alternative to conventional eggs. Given the novelty of these products, it is vital to understand consumers’ perceptions before their market launch. Perception is based on product associations stored in consumers’ memory as semantic networks. In this study we used the graphic procedure concept mapping to elicit associations of 180 consumers from the UK and Italy to explore perceptions of three types of plant-based eggs, namely liquid, powder, and egg-shaped. Concept mapping also allowed to investigate the relevance that these associations have for the consumers. Results show more complex associations among participants in the UK than Italy for all three types of plant-based eggs. ‘Price’ is the most frequently mentioned association by consumers in both countries. In terms of relevance, participants evaluated ‘healthy’, ‘animal welfare’ and ‘sustainability’ as the most important and positive attributes of plant-based eggs. Furthermore, the semantic network analysis showed that the health benefits of plant-based eggs is quickly activated in consumers’ mind and should therefore be emphasized when marketing these products. ‘Use’ of plant-based eggs, e.g., baking, is also a key association, particularly in the UK for the egg-shaped version. However, ‘use’ was generally lower rated, suggesting that the limited applications of this product (only hard-boiled) may be perceived negatively. These findings provide insights into the psychology of consumers’ acceptance of plant-based eggs and have important implications for designing successful marketing strategies for promoting plant-based eggs.     

Sourcing Food Through Social Ties: A Case Study of Starbird Fish

In this exploratory case study, I examine how the embeddedness of alternative food networks shapes consumers’ purchasing behavior. Data include nine interviews, observation, and content analysis concerning the independent, Vermont-based seafood company, Starbird Fish. I find that social ties between Starbird Fish’s owner/head fisherman and its customers mediated consumers’ purchasing behavior. Specifically, learning more about Starbird Fish’s owner’s character, the sustainable practices implemented in the fisheries where he sources his products, and the ability for him to accommodate special customer purchasing requests all increased the likelihood consumers bought products from the company. This study thereby suggests that the embeddedness of alternative food networks itself can influence buyers’ motivations.     

A general methodology for analyzing fashion oriented textile products using sensory evaluation

In a garment company, key features on garment products can generally be characterized using three information sources: (1) physical measures using appropriate devices, (2) normalized sensory evaluation data, (3) consumers’ perception on fashion styles of garments. The understanding of the relations between criteria at these three levels is important for designing new fashion oriented textile products. In this paper, we propose a method for evaluating fabric hand and similarity between fashion styles and fabric samples. Next, the relationship between these two sets of sensory data is analyzed using the data clustering algorithm and a number of linguistic similarity and relevancy measures we defined. The effectiveness of the proposed method has been validated using a set of fabric samples and a set of T-shirt products.     

Health versus environmental benefits: Does additional information influence consumer acceptance of pulse-based spreads?

Despite the known health benefits and the potential for substituting less environmentally sustainable consumed foods such as meat, the current intake of pulses in developed countries remains less than recommended. Barriers are related to sensory characteristics and lack of knowledge about preparation, while drivers of environmental benefits are intangible. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of additional information about health or environmental benefits of pulses on the acceptance of novel pulse-based products from chickpeas, black beans, and faba beans. Perceptions of these pulse-based spreads in a blind and informed stage were assessed with 202 consumers in urban and suburban areas of Denmark. In general, the familiar chickpea spread followed by the relatively most unfamiliar black bean spread was liked the most. Only for these two products, additional information increased hedonic perception, regardless of the context (health or environmental benefits). If consumers did not like the spread, as found for the faba bean spread, providing additional information did not significantly alter this perception. Participants’ preferences and willingness to pay (WTP) in a discrete choice experiment corresponded to hedonic scores, whereas providing additional information increased the WTP. These findings suggest that extrinsic cues such as health or environmental benefits may only be useful in products with an acceptable baseline taste profile. Moreover, black beans might be investigated as a promising source for further product development due to their acceptance by consumers besides being the comparably most unfamiliar pulse type.     

日本三大时尚产业发展经验借鉴

顺应消费不断升级的趋势,中国的时尚产业急需走上高级化发展之路,以满足国际化、多样化、精品化的国内中高端时尚消费。文章利用CiteSpace知识可视化软件对日本纺织服装、动漫、化妆品三大时尚产业发展过程进行聚类分析,揭示出文化、创意、科技、原材料、人才、消费者和法律政策环境等要素的重要影响,对照中国时尚产业的发展过程和现状,总结日本发展经验,并提出了在完善相关产业扶持政策及法规体系、注重创新知识产权的保护、营造时尚产业人才培养环境、关注消费者需求同时重视消费者体验与反馈,以及时尚本土化宣扬本国优秀传统文化等方面对中国的借鉴路径。     

Effect of virtual eating environment on consumers’ evaluations of healthy and unhealthy snacks

Immersive technologies such as virtual reality and augmented reality have been recently explored in the field of food consumption studies from different perspectives. The present study utilized virtual reality technology in a within-subject experiment with three conditions to examine whether a varying virtual eating environment can alter consumers’ emotional responses (positive, negative, neutral) to the eating situation and whether the resulting emotional responses correlate with consumers’ wanting, liking, and hedonic evaluations of healthy and unhealthy snacks. In addition, the study analyzed whether a virtual eating environment that generates a positive emotional response can raise consumers’ rating of a healthy snack to the same level as an unhealthy snack consumed in a plain, unimmersed environment. The results showed a correlation between positive emotional responses and the pre-tasting evaluations of both snacks. In terms of hedonic evaluations, positive emotional responses correlated mainly with consumers’ evaluation of the unhealthy snack. When pre-tasting wanting and liking evaluations are compared between experimental conditions, the results indicate that a healthy snack is rated higher in a virtual reality environment that induces a more positive emotional response. The healthy snack was also rated at the same level as the unhealthy snack consumed in a plain environment. No differences between conditions were observed in consumers’ hedonic evaluations of the products. EEG and heart rate measurement results indicate that this might be because tasting a healthy snack generates more cognitive processing than an unhealthy snack. This might reduce the influence of the virtual eating environment on consumers’ evaluations. To conclude, virtual reality technologies might have the potential to support consumers’ eating experiences and healthy food choices by improving their evaluations of the products.     

“One Fish,Two Fish,Red Fish,Blue Fish”: How ethical beliefs influence consumer perceptions of “blue” aquaculture products?

Respecting ethical beliefs of consumers is an important precondition for food manufacturers in their attempt to improve their positioning in the European food market. Based on a cross-cultural survey of 2511 European participants, this research demonstrates how ethical beliefs affect consumer perceptions of “blue” (i.e. environmentally friendly) aquaculture products. The study further emphasises that the positive effect of ethical beliefs on purchase intention operates via an indirect route mediated by consumers’ trust in a product category. Consumer involvement has limited moderation effect on the above relationships. To expand its “blue” business, a key policy recommendation to aquaculture product manufacturers and policy makers is to urge stable and reliable standards of control in environmentally responsible aquaculture production so that consumers can rely on the information source and increase their trust in aquaculture products.     

Distinguishing meat reducers from unrestricted omnivores,vegetarians and vegans: A comprehensive comparison of Australian consumers

Meat reducers are a growing but largely unexplored population subgroup in Australia. A comprehensive understanding of individual characteristics associated with meat consumption preferences can help inform strategies aimed at encouraging healthier and more environmentally sustainable food choices. Using online survey data from a nationally representative sample of 2797 Australian food shoppers, this study 1) compares characteristics (dietary, psychosocial and socio-demographic) of consumers with distinct self-identified dietary preferences (unrestricted omnivores, meat reducers, vegetarians and vegans); 2) identifies the psychosocial and socio-demographic predictors of the meat-reducer diet group; and 3) determines whether predictors of the meat-reducer diet group differ based on diet group classification method (i.e. self-identified dietary preferences versus self-reported consumption frequency of animal-source foods). Results reveal that relative to unrestricted omnivores and meat avoiders, meat reducers are unique with respect to their meat consumption behaviours; beliefs regarding the nutritional adequacy and food choice adequacy of meat-free diets; and the relative importance they place on egoistic food choice factors. Considering self-identified dietary preferences, multivariate regressions found that stronger beliefs regarding meat-free diet adequacy and lower importance placed on egoistic food choice factors predict meat reducers relative to unrestricted omnivores; and weaker beliefs regarding meat-free diet adequacy and higher importance placed on egoistic food choice factors predict meat reducers relative to meat avoiders. Findings from this study can provide insight on how to more holistically address the concerns and motivations of consumers with distinct meat consumption preferences.     

How do implicit/explicit attitudes and emotional reactions to sustainable logo relate? A neurophysiological study

Food package labels can be used to influence consumers’ evaluation and purchasing behaviour, fostering sustainable consumption. Therefore, it is important to understand consumers’ emotional reaction to food package labels that convey sustainable information. The aim of the present research is to get a better understanding of the relation between consumers’ attitudes and emotional reactions often used to measure the effectiveness of a communication. Particularly, we focused on recyclability, assessing participants’ prior explicit and implicit attitudes towards recyclability and their emotional reaction to food packages featuring logos of (non-)recyclability. The emotional reaction was measured both at an explicit and at an implicit level, using direct (self-reported) and indirect (eye movement, facial expressions and pupil dilation) techniques respectively. Results showed that explicit attitudes predicted self-reported emotions, while implicit attitudes predicted the spontaneous emotional reactions, highlighting the importance to assess both explicit and implicit attitudes. Moreover, results showed that the relation between the time that people looked at the logo and the spontaneous emotional reaction was contingent upon the participant’s implicit attitudes. Finally, a follow-up analysis revealed that people with positive implicit attitudes towards recyclability were faster in detecting the recyclable logo and spent more time on processing the logo which on its turn resulted in better emotional reactions. Thus, the results suggest that implicit attitudes influence both visual attention and emotional reactions. Overall, the research contributes to a better understanding of the relation between prior attitudes and emotional reactions to food packaging, and supports the use of an approach that comprises both direct and indirect measures of attitudes and emotions.     

Facilitators and inhibitors of organic food buying behavior

Consumption patterns across the globe indicate consumers’ rising interest in purchasing organic food due to increasing personal-health consciousness. However, research on organic food shows a low translation of this interest into stated preferences for purchasing organic food. Limited academic research has explored this puzzling buying behavior of consumers, particularly in developed economies such as Japan. Our study addresses this gap by examining the factors that facilitate or inhibit Japanese consumers’ buying behavior toward organic food. We use the Stimulus-Organism-Response framework, Innovation Resistance Theory, and Dual-Factor Theory to examine these factors by analyzing data collected from 928 consumers. We propose that health consciousness is a stimulus that has a positive impact on facilitators (natural content, nutritional content, and ecological welfare) as well as inhibitors (usage, risk, and value barriers). We further argue that stated buying behavior is the outcome of both facilitators and inhibitors. The findings confirm that health consciousness is positively associated with all facilitators and inhibitors. The analysis also reveals that all three facilitators and two inhibitors (value and risk barriers) are associated with stated buying behavior. Furthermore, buying involvement (BI) positively moderates the associations between stated buying behavior and nutritional content (facilitator) as well as risk barrier (inhibitor). Gender moderates the association of all facilitators and risk barrier with stated buying behavior.     

The effect of moderating variables on consumer preferences for sustainable wines

Previous studies have shown that credence attributes play an important and often undervalued role in consumers’ product evaluation and purchasing behavior. By contrast, the factors moderating these effects have received less attention by scholars. The current study uncovers the moderating effects of consumers’ psychographic characteristics (i.e.: subjective knowledge, wine involvement, and sustainability concern) on their preferences for wine with different credence attributes related to sustainability. A non-hypothetical economic experiment, consisting of three rounds (blindtaste, info, infotaste), was performed in Italy and Germany to assess consumers’ preferences in terms of willingness to pay for conventional wine and wine differentiated by wine sustainable certifications (i.e.: Organic, VIVA sustainable wine, Vignaioli Indipendenti, Carbon footprint). Wine sustainable certifications positively affect consumers’ preferences, and these effects are mainly moderated by individuals’ wine involvement and sustainability concern. This holds if respondents have information about the wine but do not taste it. After tasting the wine consumers’ preferences are moderated only by respondents’ sustainability concern.     

A combined Nutri-Score and ‘Eco-Score’ approach for more nutritious and more environmentally friendly food choices? Evidence from a consumer experiment in Belgium

The application of Nutri-Score on food products is ubiquitous throughout Europe and studies demonstrating its potential to stimulate healthier food choices are accumulating. At the same time, a strong need exists to evenly harmonize and activate the communication of environmental impacts on food products, in synergy with the Nutri-Score. This raises the question of whether the Nutri-Score could be expanded to an ‘Eco-Score’ that would similarly encourage environmentally friendly food choices. This paper reports a randomized control trial, in which a representative sample of 805 Belgian consumers was asked to hypothetically buy ingredients for a meal in a small-scale mock-up E-grocery environment. The experiment tested whether a combined Nutri-Score and Eco-Score affected the nutritional quality and environmental impact of consumers’ food choices. This effect was compared to general and specific dietary recommendations on the one hand, and to detailed impact tables on the other hand. Since visual distraction often plays a role in informative persuasion, the treatments were evaluated subject to different levels of distraction caused by product images. The average nutritional quality index (NQI) and environmental impact index (EII) of the selected baskets were calculated to evaluate the effects of the manipulations. We find that a joint Nutri-Score and Eco-Score label improves the NQI but not the EII. The general- and specific recommendation as well as the detailed information also improved the NQI. However, the specific recommendation was the only treatment that also improved the EII. The improvements in NQI due to the scores could be explained by a reduced consumption of pork. The improvements in EII induced by the specific recommendation could mainly be explained by a reduction in beef consumption. Only very mild indications were found that product images interfered with the effect of the scores. This study provides some initial evidence and support for the use of dual Nutri-Score – Eco-Score label to induce transitions towards healthier and more sustainable diets. We also find that recommendations outside the classic Front-Of-Package label framework could be a promising way to realize such a transition. However, it remains to be tested whether similar effects occur in real E-groceries and on a longer time scale.     

Athletic abs or big bellies: The impact of imagery,arousal levels,and health consciousness on consumers’ attitudes towards plant-based protein products

Research suggests that health-related imagery influences consumers’ product attitudes, and that both appetitive, positively framed and aversive, negatively framed imagery can be used to boost health-related responses. Arousal has been suggested as a mechanism driving such responses, but few studies in food-related consumer research have examined the link between arousal and consumers’ product attitudes. The present cross-national study, involving almost 1000 consumers (N = 959) from Denmark, Germany, Spain, and the UK, experimentally investigated whether prior exposure to healthy (vs. unhealthy) imagery influences consumers’ attitudes towards a plant-based protein product. Furthermore, the study examined whether the impact of imagery type on consumers’ product attitudes would be mediated by the arousal levels evoked by the imagery, and whether this presumed effect would be moderated by health consciousness. Participants were randomly assigned to one of the imagery conditions (healthy, unhealthy), after which they stated their arousal levels, product attitudes, health consciousness, and product-related emotions. The results revealed that arousal mediates the impact of exposure to healthy (vs. unhealthy) imagery on consumers’ product attitudes, such that healthy imagery outperforms unhealthy imagery. This effect was particularly powerful among health conscious consumers. Taken together, these findings suggest that reliance on communication campaigns, advertising efforts, and marketing messages that induces arousal seems to effectively bolster consumers’ product attitudes, with potential downstream effects on purchase and choice behavior.     

An exploratory study of urban South African consumers’ perceptions of wine and wine consumption: focus on social,emotional, and functional factors

Wine is of great economic and cultural significance for South Africa, but some population groups were until relatively recently denied equal access to wine and alcohol products. The South African wine industry has launched various campaigns in recent years that aimed at portraying wine as an acceptable and attractive choice when alcohol consumption is considered. It is therefore appropriate now to investigate whether these endeavors of the South African wine industry have resulted in particular consumer behavior and preferences that could serve as input to enhance strategies when marketing to South African consumers. This study uses the thematic analysis method to identify themes that could be of value for wine marketers. To collect data for the study, a total of 44 consumers were assigned to 6 focus groups. Eight main themes driving consumer choices emerged from the data: journey and role of life-stage, context of consumption, conceptualizations, barriers, price and purchasing, bottle closures, health, sensory perception, and cultivars. The influences of gender and ethnicity on consumers’ perceptions of wine and wine consumption were investigated. Gender produced the biggest differences in respect of respondents’ perceptions about wine and wine consumption whilst ethnicity did not appear to be of any significance.     

Extrinsic attributes responsible for red wine quality perception: A cross-cultural study between France and Spain

Understanding quality perception requires focusing both on product proprieties and consumers’ representations. The goal of this study was to access the representations of perceived extrinsic wine quality of consumers from two different wine regions in two European countries with an important wine tradition: La Rioja-RJ-(Spain) and Côtes du Rhône-CdR-(France).Twenty commercial red wines (ten from RJ and ten from CdR) were evaluated in terms of quality by means of a categorization task. Ninety-five French and 93 Spanish consumers had to categorize the 20 wines according to four levels of quality going from very low to very high quality.Three clusters of French and two of Spanish consumers have been identified. Country-of-origin of wine arises as the most important extrinsic cue for less-involved French and Spanish consumers, while more-involved consumers with higher knowledge in wine are able to interpret and use a wider range of cues. Consumers’ knowledge, involvement and nationality appear to be good predictors of quality perception.These results are relevant for the field of sensory analysis in that they help understanding the construction of quality perception. The wine industry can benefit also from these results, especially when exporting wines. This cross-cultural study may help them to develop marketing strategies able to enhance the quality perception of wines and to make use of different extrinsic factors.     

A cross-national study of young female consumer behaviour,innovativeness and apparel evaluation: China and India

Abstract

In order to advance our knowledge about consumers’ shopping behaviour and preferences in two emerging markets (China and India), the current study was undertaken to investigate (1) apparel consumers’ shopping behaviour; (2) the effect of consumer innovativeness, and (3) the salient impact of apparel evaluative cues. An online self-administered survey consisted of shopping behavioural questions, the Domain Specific Innovativeness (DSI) scale, 12 apparel cues, and demographic questions were used for this study. In total, 266 and 236 usable data were collected from Chinese and Indian female participants respectively. The findings indicated that Chinese and Indian fashion innovators tended to spend more money on new clothes than non-innovators. Chinese fashion innovators spent significantly more time shopping online than did Indian innovators. In terms of the importance of evaluative cues, fashion innovators and non-innovators in both countries considered fit to be the most important cue; style, colour, and comfort played a relatively important role in clothing evaluation as well, but ease of care and durability were cited as relatively less important among many other cues. The two least important cues were brand name and country of origin.