10 pages., Via online journal., Consumption of local food is a fast-growing trend supported by local food advocates and governments. This trend has also captured the interest of researchers. The present study draws from the foundational principles of the theoretical perspective of helping behaviour with a view to enhancing the understanding of why people buy local food. This article tests a conceptual framework with proposed relationships between helping behaviour constructs and local food-buying behaviour within a Norwegian context. Local food consumers in Troms County are surveyed, and the results indicate that empathic concern and social concern influence their attitude towards, and preference for, local food. Local patriotism influences the preference for local food even if such consumers evaluate it as being of lower quality and less desirable than other food products. This study is among the first to examine local food-buying behaviour through the lens of prosocial helping behaviour theory. The recommendations for local food producers and local food advocates regarding appealing to consumers’ prosocial helping behaviour propose communication strategies emphasizing the difficulties that local food producers face, portraying local food producers as people deserving of help against national competition and imports, and depicting them as being as loyal to the local community as the local food consumers are.
9 pages., Via online journal., Lack of trust is thought to be one of the most significant barriers to the consumption of organic foods, which is an important dimension of sustainable behaviour. Building trust in organic foods is the central objective of this paper. Based on information processing models focusing on what message to transmit and how, and on the premise that to improve trust, two different dimensions (functionality and authenticity) must be managed simultaneously, this paper analyzes the comparative effectiveness of different combinations of message arguments, forms of appeal and sources on consumer trust. To this end, an experiment was designed with a total of 800 participants, in which 36 different treatments were tested. The results show strong interactions between the three variables considered and suggest that the most effective combinations for building trust are: the health argument put across by an expert, the authenticity argument transmitted by a producers’ union, the elitist argument made by an expert and lastly, the social argument transmitted by a public authority, using an emotional form of appeal in all four cases. These results serve to complete the previous literature on the subject, in which communication activities are recommended but the questions of what to say, how to say it and who should say it are not specifically addressed.
18 pages., via online journal., Genetically modified (GM) foods have attracted a great deal of controversy. While some consumers and organizations regard GM foods as safe, many other consumers and organizations remain concerned about their potential health risks. The results of three studies suggest that consumers respond differently to persuasive messages regarding GM foods on the basis of their preexisting attitudes. Weak anti-GM consumers tend to comply with a variety of pro-GM messages. In contrast, strong anti-GM consumers exhibit message-opposing behavior. Moreover, they respond just as negatively to a safety message (claiming that GM foods are safe) as to a risk message (claiming that GM foods are unsafe). The mechanism underlying these effects is consumers’ perceived health risk. A benefit message claiming that GM foods are beneficial (e.g., more nutritious than their conventional counterparts) is a better alternative for strong anti-GM consumers. Finally, the results suggest that persuasive messages do not significantly change pro-GM consumers’ evaluations of these foods.
