Organic Foods Purchase

Paper Summary:

This paper explains that research indicates that, in the United States, perceptions factors in the purchase of organic foods relating to food safety concerns are environmental contaminants, disease-causing organisms and pesticide residues. The author points out that useful knowledge for anyone wishing to introduce consumers to organic foods is that the consumer would not perceive much risk in food until after he or she has heard about some problem; however, once that happens, it would be likely that they would make biased judgments. The paper indicates that, in contrast to nutrition knowledge, perceptions about attributes of organic foods, such as importance of nutrition, appear to be good predictors of dietary behavior; therefore, consumer information programs must be careful to reiterated nutrition as a "salient attribute" of organic food if they want to be successful in encouraging consumers to behave in a certain way.

Table of Contents
What is Consumer Behavior?
Factors Affecting Consumer Behavior
What is Perception?
Perceived Risk in Food
Price Perception
What are Attitudes?
Willingness to Pay
Resource Deficit Model
Organic Food as a Strategy to Deal with Worries about the Safety and Quality of Food
Consumer Buying Decision Process

From the Paper:

"Dean (1999) investigated three factors-advertising cues-he believed affected consumer perceptions (and therefore behavior) concerning product quality, uniqueness, manufacturer reputation and manufacturer corporate citizenship. It is likely the last of this list would have some effect on consumer behavior regarding organic foods, especially. The three cues Dean investigated were third-party product endorsement, brand popularity and event sponsorship. He found that the popularity cue lacked significant effect; also, he found that the three cues do not interact with each other significantly in forming a basis for consumer perception and arguably behavior."

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