Soft, crispy, crunchy, sustainable: The role of visual textures in shaping sustainable food preferences

Abstract

This research evaluates the potential of using visual textural complexity as a subtle yet effective strategy to direct consumer preferences towards more sustainable food choices, addressing the urgent need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the food industry.

Using a traditional Turkish rice pudding, sütlaç, as a case study, we prepared four variants with varying textural complexities (ranging from simple to complex) by reducing the portion size by half and gradually adding soft, crispy, crunchy, and airy textured food layers onto it. Two parallel sets of variants were formulated to minimize potential bias from differences in composition and visual properties of the layers. One hundred participants individually evaluated paired visual stimuli of these variants under two experimental conditions: non-informative, which included only visuals, and informative, which included visuals with accompanied by sample information.

Paired binary analysis revealed consistent preference for variants with higher levels of visual textural complexity, especially those with three layers (soft, crispy and crunchy), regardless of experimental conditions and product formulations. Although sample information affected preference scores, variants with certain levels of textural complexity were still preferred over the traditional sample (p < 0.05). Preferences for sample variants over the control reduced the carbon emission over 31 %. The study links the impact of visual textural complexity on preferences to the Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM) and demonstrates that this strategy can effectively direct consumer preferences towards more sustainable options. Adopting the insights from this study can assist food producers and marketers in contributing to the broader goal of reducing carbon emissions.