Do Consumers Prefer Foods with Nutrition and Health Claims? Results of a Purchase Simulation

This contribution reports findings of a close-to-realistic purchase simulation for foods labelled with nutrition and health claims. The results show that products with a claim are clearly preferred, but that the determining factors of choice differ between the food categories. Choice was positively influenced by perception of healthiness of the product and negatively influenced by selection of the habitually chosen brand, while age, gender and credibility of the claim were of no importance. Both low price-level of the product with a claim and scepticism towards texts on food products had contrariwise effects for different food categories. Further determinants which exercised a positive influence were product involvement, health-related food involvement, extent of information search and the presumption that the claim is scientifically proven