A Study of Chinese‐origin and European‐origin Australian Consumers’ Texture Preferences Using a Novel Extruded Product

Abstract

Diverse food choices and preferences are commonly observed between consumers cross-culturally, however, many aspects of these behavioral differences are not yet fully understood. In order to investigate cross-cultural texture preferences, six extruded snack samples, manufactured under different processing conditions to represent a range of textural characteristics were characterized by a trained panel using descriptive sensory analysis. In parallel, thirty-eight naive European-Origin and thirty-seven naive Chinese-Origin Australian consumers (t = 75) rated their preference for the snacks. The snacks were not representative of any snacks on the market and thus represented a "novel " product in both cultures. Additionally, consumers answered a simple questionnaire and completed the food neophobia scale. Results of descriptive analysis indicated significant differences (p 50.01) between the samples for 13 out of 15 descriptive attributes but no significant diflerences in preference were found between European-origin and Chinese-origin consumers. However, overall analysis of mean effects indicated that Chinese-origin consumers rated samples significantly higher than European-origin consumers (p I0.05), suggesting a cultural bias in the use of line scales. Gender did not influence texture preference, however, age significantly influenced preference for three of the samples (p I 0.05) and analysis of mean effects also indicated differences in consumers ' ratings which were related to age. Food neophobia class ijication did not influence preference, although many more Chinese-origin consumers (28) were classified as neophobic than were European-origin consumers (I I ) .' Corresponding author: TEL: +61-2 94908464; FAX: +61-2 94908499Journal of Sensory Studies 16 (2001) 485-504. All Rights Reserved. "

International preferences for pork appearance: I. Consumer choices

“…Scales to assess their preferences were not used because people, particularly from different cultures, may use them differently. For example, it has been shown that Asians are more likely to avoid the extremes of hedonic scales when compared to other ethnic groups (Yeh et al, 1998) and a cultural bias was observed between Chinese-origin and European-origin Australian consumers in the use of line scales (Murray, Easton, & Best, 2001). A measure of importance was made by having Ôhidden replicationÕ of appearance characteristics.…”

Sensory Evaluation of Indian‐style Marinated Chicken by Malaysian and European Naïve Assessors

“…There were also reports on textural preference between cultures, e.g., Jaeger et al. (1998) on preference patterns for mealiness among British and Danish consumers, and Murray et al. (2000) on the textural preferences of European and Chinese consumers.…”

Consumer choices of pork chops: Results from two Canadian sites

“…Evidence of these differences has been provided by investigations of cross-cultural differences in food preferences among consumers in different countries, including the study of British and Danish consumer preferences for different levels of apple mealiness (Jaeger, Andani, Wakeling, & MacFie, 1998), preferences for plain chocolate amongst Polish and Belgian consumers (Januszewska & Viaene, 2001) and American and Spanish consumer preferences for sweets and beverages (Zellner, Garriga-Trillo, Rohm, Centeno, & Parker, 1999). Cultural differences within a country have also been reported, such as snack texture preferences amongst Australian consumers of Chinese-and European-origin (Murray, Easton, & Best, 2001) or apple labelling preferences of New Zealand and Samoan consumers resident in New Zealand (Jaeger, 2000).…”