‘Would you like to eat an insect?’—Children's perceptions of and thoughts about eating insects

Abstract

Interest in eating insects has increased in Western countries; however, substantial challenges exist regarding acceptability and cultural ideas. Researchers have widely studied the acceptance of eating insects, but few studies have focused on children's thoughts. The aim of this study is to explore young children's perceptions about eating insects and how this insight might help understanding of ways to increase the willingness to eat insects. Three focus group interviews were conducted with children aged 4–5 years in a public preschool in Sweden. Each focus group consisted of four to five children; in total 13 (eight girls and five boys) participated. In exploring their perceptions of eating insects, the children were balancing between fantasy and reality, and between curiosity and fear, showing many, sometimes contradictory, emotions and relationships to insects as food. The children expressed a clear normative picture of what was considered food, illustrated by ideas about insects being something that are not allowed to eat. They were also concerned about whether the insect was dead before being eaten. Using children's fantasy and curiosity for new things, experimenting with insect‐based products and ingredients in well‐known dishes and contexts, and discussing different ways of eating them, acceptance of eating insects might increase.

Consumers' acceptance of the first novel insect food approved in the European Union: Predictors of yellow mealworm chips consumption

“…A promising future research direction is one that will focus on children. It is worth investigating the attitudes of children toward YMC (and IBF in general) and the attitude of their parents regarding the consumption of YMC by their children, since childhood feeding practices influence the individual's relationship with food (Branen & Fletcher, 1999 ; Nyberg et al, 2021 ) and chips are frequently consumed by children (Andaya et al., 2011 ). Therefore, a study dedicated to these groups will increase the knowledge on how to stimulate YMC consumption.…”

The Motivations for Consumption of Edible Insects: A Systematic Review

“…From the studies included in the review, twenty-five were cross-sectional studies [ 17 , 18 , 19 , 20 , 21 , 22 , 23 , 24 , 41 , 42 , 43 , 44 , 45 , 46 , 47 , 48 , 49 , 50 , 51 , 52 , 53 , 54 , 55 , 56 ]. All cross-sectional studies were supported on questionnaire surveys, while the qualitative studies were based on focus groups (five studies) [ 57 , 58 , 59 , 60 , 61 ] and interviews (one study) [ 62 ] as methodologies for data collection ( Table A1 ).…”

“…Regarding the sample, the studies included a highly variable number of participants, smaller in the qualitative studies, from a minimum of 13 [ 59 ] to a maximum of 54 [ 61 ] for focus groups and 77 [ 62 ] in the study by interview. In the cross-sectional studies, the sample size was also highly variable from a minimum of 88 [ 24 ] to a maximum of 7800 participants [ 42 ].…”

“…With respect to the age of the participants, there was one study conducted specifically with children (4–5 years) [ 59 ] and one with seniors over sixty years [ 62 ]. Some studies were specifically for young adults: 18–24 years [ 47 ], 18–35 years [ 56 ] and 20–35 years [ 57 ].…”

“…As previously mentioned, some studies also discuss which determinants affect the consumption of insects; however, they do not differentiate between positive and negative drivers. The factors that are mentioned in these studies are related with age [ 54 ], gender [ 49 , 54 ], social influence [ 60 ], familiarity [ 54 , 63 ], level of knowledge [ 62 ], tradition/culture [ 62 ], disgust [ 62 ], curiosity [ 59 , 62 ], fear [ 59 ], normative ideas [ 59 ], food neophobia [ 54 , 63 ], emotions [ 59 ], imagination [ 59 ], sensory attributes [ 62 ], safety [ 60 , 62 , 63 ], acceptable species [ 62 ], presentation [ 49 , 62 , 63 ], taste [ 60 , 63 ], availability [ 60 ], convenience [ 54 , 60 ], affordability [ 60 ], benefits beyond nutritional [ 60 ], sustainability [ 54 ], meat-related attitudes [ 54 ], appearance [ 63 ] and quality [ 63 ].…”