Quality attributes and harmful components of cured meats: Exploring the attitudes of Italian consumers towards healthier cooked ham

Abstract

In recent decades, processed meat consumers have drastically revised their consumption patterns and have gained an increasing awareness of related health concerns. Although several studies have examined the role of meat products in the human diet, we observed a certain scarcity in the multiperspective approach to the health implications of cocked ham. Therefore, we decided to verify different sources of potentially unhealthy constituents by simultaneously analysing the role that saturated fats, salt and nitrites play in consumer perception. The purpose of this paper was to investigate consumer preferences for healthier processed meat, in particular the specific objective of this study was to evaluate the balance between intrinsic and extrinsic characteristics and the components or additives that could pose a risk to the health of consumers, by considering the sensory and marketing characteristics involved in the choice of cooked ham. With these aims, two different analyses on stated preferences were carried out: firstly, a principal component analysis was performed to identify the main consumer attitudes towards meat products; subsequently, a conjoint analysis was carried out in order to identify the descriptive attributes. The results show that the presence of high salt content and nitrites discourage the intention to purchase, as the presence of a high fat content also does, however at the same time, consumers attach importance to taste, colour and juiciness that are strongly influenced by the above mentioned potentially unhealthy compounds. The overall results are strongly consistent with previous studies but evidence a certain dichotomy between sensory properties and health attributes.

The Willingness to Pay in the Food Sector. Testing the Hypothesis of Consumer Preferences for Some Made in Italy Products

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“…The local origin of beef is less important than price, "animal welfare", animal breed, brand and organic label for the consumers from the northwest of Italy [29]. Italian consumers who pay attention to the sensory aspects of meat products are not interested in the Italian origin of the product [30]. The label seems to be a valid and important source of information, nutritional and non-nutritional, which determines the willingness to pay a premium price for these products [27,[31][32][33][34][35][36].…”

The Role of Individual Knowledge in Functional Olive Oil Preferences: Does Self-Coherence Lead to Different Health Attributes Perception?

“…The perceived healthiness of food tends to decrease in the presence of high sodium content or additives, fats, and carbohydrates [ 2 ]. On the other hand, food that has high protein content is often deemed healthy [ 1 , 2 , 3 ].…”

Is There a Promising Market for the A2 Milk? Analysis of Italian Consumer Preferences

“…The Contingent Valuation Method (CVM) was originally developed in environmental economics [26], but it is well suited to soliciting consumers' WTP for a product that is not yet on the market [27] and it is often preferred over other methods, such as experimental markets, for its flexibility and limited costs [28]. In fact, there are many examples in the literature which use CVM to estimate the importance for consumers of indication of origin of the product, quality certifications, or a particular method of production (organic) indicated on the label [29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39]. The contingent valuation consists of creating a hypothetical market for a non-market good in which the consumer expresses the WTP for buying it, which corresponds to the utility derived from its consumption.…”