Influence of health consciousness and food safety concerns on consumer attitudes towards organic food

Master's Thesis from the year 2015 in the subject Business economics - Offline Marketing and Online Marketing, ( Middlesex University in London ), language: English, abstract: This dissertation analyses the specific role of the two factors health consciousness and food safety on consumer attitudes and their purchase intentions in relation to organic food. The investigation will deliver evidence from the Generation Y from two of the major countries consuming organic products: Germany and United Kingdom. Until now there have not been sufficient studies about organic foods in relation to health consciousness and food safety, so the aim of this study is to fill this gap. The purpose of the study is to demonstrate how health consciousness and food safety affects consumer attitudes and purchase intentions towards organic products. This will be done through a review of previous secondary literature as well as a questionnaire distributed online via e-mail and Facebook. The total number of respondents was 203. Researchers suggested several new approaches on how to deliver a more precise outcome on organic consumption. These recommendations were taken into consideration and a new methodology was developed. An online questionnaire was distributed in order to answer the hypotheses and find out what drives the Millenials to buy organic, as they seem to have different consumption patterns than previous generations. To observe the desired results, the Theory of Planned Behaviour by Icek Ajzen (1985) was extended with self-identity concepts and moral norms, items that were found by previous researchers to have a significant influence on intentions to purchase organic foods (Aertsens et al., 2009; Arvola et al., 2008; Dean & Shepherd, 2012; Hagger & Chatzisarantis, 2006; Sparks & Shepherd, 1992; Zanoli & Naspetti, 2002). The results support the assumption, that Germans prefer organic produce over the British participants. In the UK, there is a gap between the non-consumers and the consumers of organic foods. As previous studies stated, they question organic regulation standards and production methods more than the Germans, who mostly trust in their organic production chain (Gerrard et al., 2013; Zander, 2014). Moreover, both parties believe in health supporting attributes of this style of farming, which can be named as a reason for the steady growth of organic demand.