Journal Article

Gen Z’s Willingness to Adopt Plant-Based Diets: Empirical Evidence from Greece, India, and the UK

Tsiami, Amalia, Negro, Giulia, Ghuriani, Veena, Raptou, Elena, Smaoui, Slim, Baweja, Pooja, Varzakas, Theodoros

2024

Overview

Comprising the largest population cohort on this planet, Gen Z presents a future-oriented consumer segment driven by climate change and food. This study sought to investigate Gen Z’s perceptions toward plant-based foods and diets and explore the relationship that attitude components, meal preparation involvement, personal and lifestyle factors, and perceived barriers in adopting a plant-based diet have with willingness to adopt green-eating practices. Using cross-sectional data from university students in Greece, India, and the UK, various tools were employed to determine the factors influencing youths’ consumer behavior toward animal-protein substitutes. PCA indicated the underlying dimensions of students’ viewpoints on plant-based foods, whereas hierarchical and k-means clustering provided the cluster structure. An ordered probit model was estimated to delineate Gen Z’s willingness to adopt plant-based diets and distinguish among mostly unwilling, somewhat willing, and mostly willing youths. Our findings identified two consumer segments, namely proponents and opponents of plant-based foods and diets, with statistically significant differences in the perceived health benefits of plant-based diets, attachment to animal-based proteins, perceived exclusion of animal-based foods, dissatisfaction with plant-based foods’ attributes, and demand for ensuring adequate protein intake. The ordered probit model estimates showed that there is a “homogeneity” in the factors influencing youths’ intention to adopt plant-based diets, with attitude components, meal preparation indicators, perceived barriers to eating “green”, and personal factors, such as self-assessed knowledge of healthy eating and physical activity, being strongly associated with students’ willingness to switch to plant-based diets in all three countries. Mapping potential obstacles and enablers in terms of shifting to more green-eating behaviors, our findings could add information to better understand the factors affecting food choice and youths’ transition to a more sustainable lifestyle.

• Publisher: MDPI AG
• Subject: Animal-based foods / Attitudes / attitudes toward plant-based foods / Climate change / Cluster analysis / Clustering / consumer behavior / Consumers / Diet / Eating / Eating behavior / Environmental conditions / Food / food choices / Food intake / food preparation / Gender identity / Generation Z / Greece / Homogeneity / India / lifestyle / Lifestyles / meal preparation involvement / Nutrition research / ordered probit model analysis / PCA / Perceptions / Physical activity / plant-based diet / Plant-based foods / Population studies / probit analysis / protein intake / Proteins / Questionnaires / Segments / Sociodemographics / Statistical analysis / Students / Trends / University students / Vector quantization / willingness to adopt plant-based diets