Choosing sustainable meat? Understanding and fostering consumer adoption of alternative meat

Reducing meat consumption is crucial to transition to a more sustainable food system, but contemporary dietary interventions have been relatively ineffective due to two key limitations. Firstly, behavioural intervention research to date has failed to consider wider contextual factors, such as personal (e.g., moments of change in lifestyle), socio-cultural (e.g., food tradition) and geographical (e.g., availability of food) factors. Secondly, studies on novel food products such as plant-based and cell-cultured meat are lacking. In fact, efforts to encourage consumer adoption of these alternative meats is further limited by concerns over the safety of these novel food products, and perceptions of unnaturalness and disgust towards the synthetic production methods.

Overall, these limitations present a novel opportunity to warrant an interdisciplinary approach to better understand our food behaviour surrounding alternative meat. Drawing on the food geography literature, the concept of "foodscapes" examines how physical (e.g., food availability and accessibility) and socio-cultural (e.g., food tradition and practices) environments influence, and are influenced by, the process in which we acquire, prepare and consume food. When applied to alternative meat, this suggests that the adoption of alternative meat is largely determined by the availability, accessibility, affordability, convenience and acceptance of alternative meat in the foodscape. How we conceptualise and experience such novel food products is thus inherently embedded within our (individualised) foodscape (Clary et al., 2017), which may vary according to changes in geographical, cultural and economic contexts over time, but such variations have hardly been explored.

By applying a foodscape perspective, this proposal aims to (a) examine what geographical, sociological and psychological factors shape consumer acceptance and consumption of alternative meat (including plant-based and cell-cultured meat), and (b) design and test behavioural change interventions for fostering the adoption of alternative meat.

Method
Phase 1 will apply a qualitative focus group method to understand (a) the perception of availability, attractiveness and affordability of meat and meat alternatives, (b) social, geographical, and psychological drivers of and barriers to acceptance, and (c) consumer expectations of meat alternatives. Phases 2 and 3 then test 'upstream' and 'downstream' (i.e., contextual and individual) interventions for promoting alternative meat consumption. Phase 2 will manipulate (a) price and characteristics of meat and meat alternatives, (b) framing of food product information, and (c) use of eco-labels to test consumers' willingness to pay as a method to quantify acceptance, alongside examining the impacts of psychological values and barriers, geographical, cultural and economic factors on the interventions used. Phase 3 will investigate default options on food menus using online and field experiments. Overall, representative samples of participants from the UK public will be recruited via social media, gatekeeper organisations and Prolific where necessary.

Impact
Given imminent changes to the regulatory landscape of novel food items, this proposal will be timely and crucial in providing evidence-based research on consumer behaviour to inform future policy and industrial needs. The Food Standards Agency and Bryant Research will collaborate to provide insights and experience through co-supervision to ensure this research is impactful and applicable to policy. 3DBT and Aleph Farm will co-design studies to inform the production and marketing of alternative meat. Bryant Research has also offered a 6-month placement opportunity to gain working experience with industrial clients.