Social Representations of Insects as Food: An Explorative-Comparative Study among Millennials and X-Generation Consumers.

Roberto Fasanelli,Alfonso Piscitelli,Roberta Riverso,Ida Galli

doi:10.3390/insects11100656

Roberto Fasanelli, Alfonso Piscitelli + Show 2 more

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https://doi.org/10.3390/insects11100656

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Abstract

Simple SummaryIn recent years, a remarkable number of studies have investigated entomophagy from different perspectives. Nevertheless, the theoretical framework of social representations (SRs) has never been used. SRs are organized sets of opinions, knowledge, attitudes, and beliefs about a social object—such as novel foods—co-constructed and shared by a social group. The present research is the first attempt to study entomophagy in the theoretical and methodological framework of SRs. We followed a double trajectory corresponding to two different ways to imagine the contribution of SRs to entomophagy studies. The first one focuses on the role of SRs in the social construction of meanings attached to entomophagy and on their introduction in individuals’ and groups’ thinking frameworks. The second proposes SRs as predictors, even if non-deterministic, of consumers’ behaviors. The results stimulate consideration of social knowledge and cultural variables in food studies using the theoretical framework of SRs.The aim of the research here presented is to describe and compare the social representations of entomophagy co-constructed and circulating among different groups of consumers. Social representations theory (SRT) allows us to understand a social reality that the individual builds based on his own experience in everyday life symbolic exchanges, whose primary function is to adapt concepts and abstract ideas using objectification and anchoring processes. We carried out this research within the structural approach methodological framework. We explored the structure (central core and peripheral schemes) and the content (information, opinions, attitudes, and beliefs) of the social representations of entomophagy by using mixed methodological strategies (hierarchized evocations, validated scales, check-list, projective tool, open-ended questions). Data were processed employing different R packages. The main results show an essential role played by generative processes (objectification and anchoring) as well as cognitive polyphasia and thémata in the co-construction of the social representations of entomophagy. Data could help in understanding the sensory characteristics of “insects as food” that should be used or avoided, for example, in communication aimed to promote entomophagy.

Highlights

In his preface to Saadi Lalou’s book “Penser manger” [1], Moscovici [2] argues that in the postmodern era our relationship with the table, with eating, that is, with food, has been completely overturned
The paper is organized as follows: in Section 1.1, we described the theoretical framework of social representations (SRs) and the importance of the SRs approach to entomophagy
We reported the links between the semantic categories implied in quotations, complemented by the relative index of Russel and Rao (RR), to indicate their strength

Summary

Introduction

In his preface to Saadi Lalou’s book “Penser manger” [1], Moscovici [2] argues that in the postmodern era our relationship with the table, with eating, that is, with food, has been completely overturned. Erst kommt das Fressen, dann kommt die Moral, first comes food, comes morality. This axiom is opposed by that of the Millennials and Z-Generation [3], for whom, on the contrary, first comes the morality, comes the food. Today we have put ourselves so well in the hands of experts, continues Moscovici, and we rely so much on doctors and advertisers that we can hardly see the loss of autonomy that comes with it because we no longer know how to eat or sleep “without their permission”. A few of these discoveries become known by laypeople and discussed among friends, family, and colleagues

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