While the ethnic food market has become increasingly important in Italy, the effects of the hybridization of consumption patterns have been slowed by a consolidated culinary tradition. This study investigates the relationships among ethnic food consumption, food neophobia, and openness to different cultures with sociodemographic characteristics. A sample of 1317 Italian consumers responded to an online survey. The sociodemographic profile of the neophobic consumer appears to substantially differ from that of the consumer with an attitude of openness. Neophobic respondents are males, are older than 55 years of age, are less educated, have children, are retired, have difficulty meeting their financial responsibilities, and do not eat ethnic food. Respondents who are more open to different cultures are young adults, are highly educated, have no children, are employed, and are consumers of ethnic food. The relationship between food neophobia and openness to different cultures is confirmed to be the relationship between these variables and ethnic food consumption. The measurement of these characteristics could serve as a crucial indicator for analyzing the willingness to accept elements of novelty in an increasingly multicultural society. Additionally, consumers with the neophobic trait and who are less open to different cultures might have a less varied diet that is essential to good health.

Several factors drive consumer behavior in buying meat, particularly rabbit meat. The consumption of rabbits has decreased in Europe, and the main causes of this trend are an increasing association with the perception of rabbits as pets, consumers’ changes in lifestyle, and eating habits. Additionally, increasing attention is paid to ethical issues regarding animal welfare. Investigating consumers’ knowledge, perceptions, and concerns about rabbit meat production and consumption are crucial for improving market strategies. This study investigated consumers’ perspectives of rabbit meat to provide useful information to producers for promoting this sector to consumers. A mixed-methods research design was applied. Qualitative data were collected through four focus group discussions involving 32 consumers and quantitative data through a semi-structured questionnaire administered nationally and completed by 1001 consumers. The limited use of antibiotics in inbreeding and the absence of animal suffering are factors that most influence consumers’ willingness to purchase rabbit meat. Rural/domestic farms were recognized as places where animal welfare measures can be applied and have a positive influence not only on organoleptic quality but also on ethical value and food safety. The cage was perceived as unsuitable for rabbit growth and was oriented to a process of fattening based on industrial feed and antibiotics. Respondents sought information on rabbit farming during purchase, and the label was the most used tool. The rabbit meat production sector should consider these results to meet consumers’ demands and raise awareness among operators on the use of animal welfare-based farming systems, helping to build a more positive image of the rabbit meat industry.

The European Journal of Social Psychology (EJSP), as the voice of the European Association of Social Psychology, aims to promote diversity and a distinctively ‘European’, more ‘social’, social psychology (SP). However, whether and how these objectives have been accomplished over time remains controversial. This article enters this debate, tracing the history of SP as depicted by EJSP publications, via two types of lexicometric analyses of all abstracts of the Journal (1971–2016). Themes, processes, methods, and their organisation in cycles and clusters over time, were identified and analysed. Regarding diversity, findings indicate that the publications reflect several of the new theoretical proposals that emerged over the years, but do not fully reflect the variety of perspectives and methods of the discipline. It further indicates that lately the ‘social’ is predominantly present in attention to pressing social issues, albeit the processes involved in them are mostly theorised at an individualistic level. This pattern suggests the importance of keeping open the quest for epistemological and methodological diversity, and of re‐problematising what the ‘social’ in SP means. By contributing to mapping the history of SP, offering a more comprehensive and reflexive view for it, the present analyses also help in forging a stronger discipline.

In the summer of 2017, several European Union Member States were involved in a food alert caused by the presence of fipronil pesticide residues in chicken eggs. The food alert became a major news and received wide coverage both in the mass media and on the Internet. This article describes a study that analyzed how the Italian online information sources represented the fipronil alert, using web monitoring techniques and both manual and automatic content analysis methods. The results indicate that the alert was amplified because general news media could represent the alert within the frame of a political scandal, and because different social actors exploited the case. However, online information sources correctly communicated that the risks for consumers were low, reporting mainly what was officially communicated by the Italian health authorities. The study provides empirical evidence on how the online information sources represent food risks and food alerts and offers useful indications for health authorities in charge of the public communication of food risks.

Background With rapid evolution of the internet and web 2.0 apps, online sources have become one of the main channels for most people to seek food risk information. Thus, it would be compelling to analyze the coverage of online information sources related to biological, chemical, and nutritional food risks, and related safety issues, to understand the type of content that online readers are exposed to, possibly influencing their perceptions. Objective The aim of this study was to identify the types of online sources that are predominantly covering this theme, and the topics that have received the most attention in terms of coverage and engagement on social media. Methods We performed an analysis of big data related to food risks by combining web monitoring techniques, content analysis, and data visualization of a large amount of unstructured text. Using a dictionary-based approach, a web monitoring app was instructed to automatically collect web content referring to the food risk and safety field. Data were retrieved from March 2017 to February 2018. The validated corpus (N=12,163) was subject to automatic and manual content analysis. Results were combined with descriptive statistics extracted from Web-Live and processed with Qlik Sense. Results Nutritional risks and news about outbreaks, controls, and alerts were the most widely covered topics. Thematic sources devoted major attention to nutritional topics, whereas national sources covered food risks, especially during food emergencies. Regarding engagement on social media, readers’ interest was higher for nutritional topics and animal welfare. Although traditional sources still publish a great amount of content related to food risks and safety, new mediators have emerged as alternative sources for food risk information. Conclusions This mixed methodological approach was demonstrated to be a useful means for obtaining an accurate characterization of the online discourse on food risks, and can provide insight into how the monitored sources contribute to the process of risk communication.

Despite policies aimed at increasing bicycle use, and the health benefits identified in the literature, cycling mobility is still quite limited in most cities. A cultural transformation is needed to change this situation. E-bikes might be capable of triggering this change, and turning the proposition of cycling into the preferred choice for everyday mobility. To explore this possibility, the present study extends a previous analysis conducted on the representation of cycling in Italian media, and further investigates its content as regards e-bikes. We identified a textual corpus of 3,239 articles dealing with bicycles published in Italian online publications in 2017 and subjected them to lexicometric analyses. The representation of cycling was found to be stable and only marginally fit the envisaged change in the mobility paradigm. Coverage revolved around a few main themes: infrastructure, mobility, and security and safety. The subcorpus relating to e-bikes (N ¼ 200) showed that the representation of e-bikes added to the dominant representation of cycling without transforming it. Despite their still largely utilitarian and structural contents, the appearance of new perspectives relating to sustainable urban mobility associated with e-bikes introduces novelty in the representation of cycling that deserves to be carefully monitored.

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