Determinants of willingness to eat insects in the USA and India

Abstract

One of the major, if not the major impediment to large scale increases of human insect consumption, is the strong rejection of insects as food by most of the world’s population. In an effort to understand this aversion, we surveyed online samples of adults living in the USA and India to participate in a study on ‘attitudes toward food’. A substantial proportion of both Americans (72%) and Indians (74%) were at least willing to consider eating some form of insect food. Men were more willing to try eating insects than were women, especially in the USA. Disgust seems to be the most common reaction of both groups at the prospect of eating insects. The most common perceived benefits of eating insects were related to nutrition and environmental sustainability, and the most common risks related to risk of disease and illness. Both groups find ants the most palatable of a set of seven possible insects, and cockroaches the most unpalatable. In both samples, participants were most amenable to eating low levels of insect flour in a favourite food, and most averse to consuming whole insects. The best predictors of insect acceptance were disgust at the thought of eating insects, beliefs about the benefits of eating insects, sensation seeking, and the enjoyment of telling others about consumption of unusual foods.

Edible insects are the future?

“…Consumers, familiar with edible insects accepted these processed insects readily and it facilitated commercialisation. It has also been suggested that gradually increasing concentrations of insects in flour might be effective (110) . This has been called the bottom-up approach, contrary to the top-down approach in which expensive restaurants have insects on the menu (see next point).…”

“…It is not primarily based on the sensory properties of potential foods, but rather on knowledge of the nature or history of a potential food. Interestingly, disgust has been identified as the main reason for persons totally rejecting insects as food (110) . It has been proposed to harness disgust as a positive feature of insects, what Rozin et al (111) called benign masochism.…”

“…The majority of two non-consuming groups from a completely different cultural background, USA (72 %) and India (74 %), were willing to do so (110) . Gender seems to have an effect; men, both in Belgium (112) and the USA (110) are more likely to adopt insects as a substitute for meat. Familiarity and experience with the food is also important for its acceptance.…”

“…Providing information about the benefits of edible insects. In India and the USA, the most common perceived benefits of edible insects were related to nutrition and environmental sustainability (110) . Benefit perception is derived from heuristic information processing and personal experience (115) .…”

“…Providing information about food safety. In the USA, half of the respondents perceived microbes and disease as a risk of eating insects (110) . Conversely, the majority of the respondents in Australia and the Netherlands indicated that there were no risks associated with eating insects.…”