New insights into perceptions of technology claims in greek-style yogurt: A view in the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Covid-19 pandemic has strongly impacted people's lives and the food industry. In this sense, food products claiming nutritional and health-promoting benefits due to the presence of bioactive peptides and probiotics, such as Greek-style yogurt, have been in demand. The objective of this work was to investigate, through word association, the perception of the consumers regarding the seven concepts related to Greek-style yogurt (traditional, ultra-creamy, zero fat, high content proteins, zero lactose, light and with no added sugars), in the context of social isolation due to Covid-19. In this online survey, 346 participants completed a questionnaire. The participants were divided according to health concerns (increased, not changed, or decreased) and eating habits (improved, not changed, or worsened) during the Covid-19 pandemic. Chi-square and prototypical analysis were used as statistical tests. During the Covid-19 pandemic, based on self-report, around 66% of the participants had their eating habits and their concerns about health changed. The general associations were related to the categories pleasure, health, creamy, pleasant texture, food restriction, and loss of sensory quality. 'Health' and 'pleasure' were negatively associated with the conceptualization of Greek-style yogurt. For the zero-fat, light, and sugar-free Greek-style yogurts, the terms creamy and ultra-creamy are sensory appealing to the consumers. In general, the price and concerns about health are factors that strongly influence the purchase intention of Greek-style yogurts. The yogurts were associated with sensory and non-sensory characteristics, which can be useful for marketing strategies for of different product concepts.

Health beliefs towards kefir correlate with emotion and attitude: A study using an emoji scale in Brazil.

Emojis can be used to explore food-evoked emotions in order to provide information that can support the product development and marketing decisions. This study aimed to evaluate consumers' acceptance, purchase intent and emotional responses to milk beverages, with and without kefir added, before and after these consumers were informed about the products' composition (0%, 15%, 30% and 50% m/v) and health claims toward kefir (blind and informed tests, respectively). Emotional responses were assessed by emoji use within a RATA questionnaire in order quantify the perceived significance of the emojis chosen. In the informed test, the consumers' perception of the sensory attributes of the milk beverages, such as their perception of an acid taste in added kefir beverages was shown to have changed. Overall, participants attributed significantly higher acceptance and purchase intent scores to added kefir beverages after they had been informed on its health benefits. In addition, expressions of positive emotion increased when participants were exposed to stimuli related to health benefits of kefir (15%, 30% and 50% m/v), while negative expressions of emotion decreased. The provided information of kefir modified valence and arousal in subjects, and it can be said that to 30% of kefir can be added to yogurt without compromising its sensory acceptability. Thus, health benefits alone cannot improve product acceptance, since participants found a 50% addition of kefir to be unpleasant when tasted during a blind test. Mixed beverages may present a probiotic beverage alternative for consumers who dislike kefir milk, but want to include it in their diets. The implications of liking and purchase intent and how they are linked to emotions are discussed in this paper as well.

Influence of package and health-related claims on perception and sensory acceptability of snack bars.

Concerns for health can lead to healthier food choices, especially if the consumer is well informed. This study aimed to evaluate the importance of package and health-related claims on Brazilian consumers' acceptance of snack bars. In order to evaluate package attributes, in focus groups discussions, 19 consumers chose the most important factors that influence their purchase decisions. Next, 102 consumers evaluated six commercial brands of snack bars in a three-session acceptance test: the first with no information about the product, the second containing the product package and the third with information on health-related claims associated with consumption of the bar. In general, package attributes, price and flavor were the most important factors that influence the purchase of snack bars. Health claims positively influenced consumer acceptance, but information concerning the absence of gluten and lactose did not significantly alter sensory acceptance. The presence of omega-3s, sugars, preservatives, flavorings and colorings have the potential to improve acceptability, because they were able to raise the acceptance of the seed bar, removing it from the rejection region. Protein and nut bars are not well known to the general public and the lower mean acceptance of the seed and protein bars demonstrated the need for sensorial improvement.