The taste of cuteness: How claims and cute visuals affect consumers’ perception of insect-based foods

Whether for ethical or personal health considerations, people are increasingly searching for avenues to diversify their protein intake sources. Across all main categories of alternative proteins, edible insects face the highest consumer reluctance. The present study delves into insect-based bread (virtue/functional) and chips (vice/hedonic) products to investigate how specific claims combined with cute visual elements can affect young consumers' emotions, perception, and acceptance. Eight packaging versions were compared and rated by Colombian and French respondents – who vary in terms of their perception and preference toward bread and chips products. Results revealed a positively significant effect of the cute visual on reported emotions, expected product liking, tastiness, and purchase intentions – with a different impact on functional and hedonic products. The efficiency of tested arguments (i.e. healthiness/tastiness perception and willingness to purchase) was also found to vary significantly according to their congruency (nutritional claim) or complementarity (palatability claim) with both the product type and visual design (hedonic or functional) on which they appeared. Differences were also observed according to respondents’ gender and country of belonging. For instance, the former claim better enhanced purchase intentions with men; the latter with women. Importantly, the environment claim exceeds the effectiveness of both these claims. We believe that these results – considering key sociocultural aspects of sensory perceptions and preferences for innovative foodstuff – may be of particular importance in the context of sustainable gastronomy, as well as inspiring for policy makers and business working in this field.