A self-report measure of attitudes toward the eating of insects: construction and validation of the Entomophagy Attitude Questionnaire

Abstract

Research has made steps towards the understanding of the main drivers and barriers related to Western consumers’ acceptance of food with ingredients derived from insects. Nevertheless, research has been hampered by the absence of a comprehensive, specific, and validated instrument for measuring consumer attitudes towards entomophagy. The current study presents a new self-report instrument for addressing this issue. The instrument was built upon three conceptual cores, which are reflected in the three factors emerged and tested through factor analyses performed on a representative sample of the Danish population (Study 1: N = 975), and a convenience Italian sample (Study 2: N = 543). The first factor represents the negative evaluation of direct entomophagy and is closely connected to disgust. The second factor represents the positive evaluation of direct entomophagy and is closely linked to individuals’ interest to try novel experiences and to eat novel foods. The third factor addresses indirect entomophagy, that is, the attitude towards using insects for feeding other animals that are reared for human consumption. Compared to existing measures of disgust and neophobia, the new instrument performs better in predicting intention in relation to both direct and indirect entomophagy.