Health- or Environment-Focused Text Messages as a Potential Strategy to Increase Plant-Based Eating among Young Adults: An Exploratory Study

Health-driven mechanism of organic food consumption: A structural equation modelling approach

The COVID-19 pandemic seriously threatened human survival and development. It has also highlighted the significant correlation between ecological and public health. After three years of the COVID pandemic, Chinese consumers have become more aware of the importance of health. Especially in the Internet era, consumers' purchasing methods and health awareness have been changed. Consumers can buy nutritious and organic foods. To understand the impact of consumer psychology and health beliefs on the willingness to purchase organic food in the post-pandemic period, this study uses organic beef as an example and extracts key variables from three basic theories. The three basic theories include the Health Belief Model (HBM), the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB), and the Norm Activation Model (NAM), respectively. Specifically, perceived susceptibility and severity are combined to form a health belief variable that can drive organic food purchasing. In contrast, perceived benefit, moral norms, self-efficiency, and controllability are introduced as mediating variables to construct the health driving factors of organic beef purchasing. Structural equation modeling (SEM) and mediation effect tests are used to analyse 539 samples. Meanwhile, paths and mechanisms between health concern and other variables are explored. The results show that health concern is an important driving factor. Health concern can significantly promote the formation of willingness to purchase organic beef. Mediation effect tests suggest that health concern can indirectly affect the willingness to purchase organic beef through perceived benefit, moral norms, and controllability, but the mediation effect of self-efficiency is not significant. This study provides important references for government regulation and certification of organic foods as well as for enterprises'organic food marketing strategies.

Barriers to Adopting a Plant-Based Diet in High-Income Countries: A Systematic Review

Adopting a plant-based diet (PBD) has been shown to reduce the risk of developing certain diseases and is linked to environmental benefits. This review synthesises the evidence on the barriers adults aged 18 to 65 living in high-income countries (HIC) may experience when adopting a PBD. A systematic literature review was conducted using four search databases: Medline, Embase, Global Health, and Web of Science. Barriers were mapped to behaviour change strategies using the COM-B model. Ten studies were included in the final review, including 1740 participants. Five were qualitative, four were cross-sectional, and one was a pre- and-post-intervention study. In total, 40 barriers were identified and synthesised into 11 themes: financial, lack of knowledge, emotional, health, convenience, social, enjoyment of meat, environmental, accessibility, personal ability, and media. Of the 40 barriers, nutritional intake/requirements (categorised into the "health" theme) had the most evidence. This barrier encompassed concerns around being able to meet nutritional needs if an individual were to adopt a PBD. Habits (in the "personal ability" theme), which included established eating habits and habitual behaviours relating to animal-source foods, had the second most evidence alongside the barrier of not knowing what to eat as part of a PBD (in the "lack of knowledge" theme). Education interventions and communication/marketing policies were the behaviour change mechanisms mapped onto these barriers. Future interventions should focus on informing individuals about what to consume as part of a nutritionally balanced PBD and facilitating habitual dietary change.

Forty-five years of research on vegetarianism and veganism: A systematic and comprehensive literature review of quantitative studies

Meat production and consumption are sources of animal cruelty, responsible for several environmental problems and human health diseases, and contribute to social inequality. Vegetarianism and veganism (VEG) are two alternatives that align with calls for a transition to more ethical, sustainable, and healthier lifestyles. Following the PRISMA guidelines, we conducted a systematic literature review of 307 quantitative studies on VEG (from 1978 to 2023), collected from the Web of Science in the categories of psychology, behavioral science, social science, and consumer behavior. For a holistic view of the literature and to capture its multiple angles, we articulated our objectives by responding to the variables of "WHEN," "WHERE," "WHO," "WHAT," "WHY," "WHICH," and "HOW" (6W1H) regarding the VEG research. Our review highlighted that quantitative research on VEG has experienced exponential growth with an unbalanced geographical focus, accompanied by an increasing richness but also great complexity in the understating of the VEG phenomenon. The systematic literature review found different approaches from which the authors studied VEG while identifying methodological limitations. Additionally, our research provided a systematic view of factors studied on VEG and the variables associated with VEG-related behavior change. Accordingly, this study contributes to the literature in the field of VEG by mapping the most recent trends and gaps in research, clarifying existing findings, and suggesting directions for future research.

Health- or Environmental-Focused Text Messages to Increase Consumption of a Sustainable Diet among Young Adults: Importance of Expected Taste

Taste is a frequently cited barrier to the greater adoption of plant-based foods, a dietary pattern associated with both health and environmental benefits. To examine the role of expected taste in promoting greater adoption of plant-based foods, we examined the impact of a text-message intervention on the expected taste of both meat- and plant-protein foods. Young adults (n = 159) were randomly assigned to receive either health- or environment-focused text messages twice a week for eight weeks. Study measures (pre- and post-) included dietary recalls, the expected tastiness of meat- and plant-protein images and plant-based diets, consumption intention, and person-related factors such as moral satisfaction and the subjective norms of plant-based eating and health and environmental values. Participants rating plant-protein foods tastier at baseline were more likely to report higher actual (p < 0.001) and intended (p = 0.017) consumption of plant proteins following the intervention. While text messages had a limited effect on altering the expected taste of specific plant-protein foods, the messages did elevate the expected tastiness of plant-based diets. Baseline person-related factors positively predicted changes in expected tastiness of plant-based diets. Messages promoting plant-based foods may be more effective if these foods are first perceived as tasty. Furthermore, incorporating person-related considerations into messaging strategies may improve the expected taste of plant-based foods.

The Influence of Framing Plant-Based Products in Terms of Their Health vs. Environmental Benefits: Interactions with Individual Wellbeing

Significant reductions in the consumption of meat and dairy products are required to limit environmental damage and meet climate targets. However, individuals choosing to adopt plant-based diets still form a minority. Whilst different types of message framings have been suggested to be a potential means of encouraging the uptake of plant-based diets, recent findings have often failed to document any differences in people's willingness to reduce their consumption of animal products based on whether messages emphasize the health or environmental benefits of plant-based diets. This research examined whether individual wellbeing might interact with health versus environmental message frames to determine people's liking and willingness to pay for plant-based products. Across two experiments with a university (Study 1) and a non-student, adult sample (Study 2), participants were exposed to different hypothetical labels for plant-based foods and asked to rate their liking and willingness to pay for each. In line with existing findings, results demonstrated a trend whereby showing health (versus environmental) information on food labels did not in itself influence participants perceptions of the food products. Higher levels of positive wellbeing were associated with greater liking and willingness to pay for the plant-based foods (B values ranging from 0.04 to 0.45). Further, there was an interaction effect whereby levels of negative affect were differentially linked to liking and willingness to pay across the health and environmental framing conditions (B values ranging from 0.03 to 0.38). In particular, negative affect appears to have a greater negative impact on the product liking and willingness to pay when environmental label framings are used. This effect was most pronounced for the product liking dependent variable (B = -0.29 in the environmental framing condition). This research therefore extends understandings of the more specific instances in which message framings can impact perceptions of plant-based foods. The implications of the findings for understanding how best to promote uptake of plant-based diets are discussed.