A transdisciplinary study of consumer belief, behavior and microbial contamination in preparing a meal

The prevention of consumer food poisoning is an important issue from the point of view of public health. For this purpose, information interventions targeted at the behavior of consumers during food preparation are an essential part of developing an effective intervention strategy. However results from psychological research have shown that the development of effective intervention strategies is problematic, and indicate that consumers do not readily adopt safe food preparation practices. To be successful in communication relevant risk information, targeted campaigns should be developed in which technical risk assessments and risk perception/communication are integrated. To achieve this, close cooperation between, microbiologists and risk psychologists is required. The primary aim of the research is to explore and try to understand the relations between consumer practices, the resulting microbial contamination, and their risk perceptions regarding current food preparation practices. A study will be reported in which these relations were explored by asking Dutch consumers to prepare a chicken salad in their own kitchen. Cross-contamination during food preparation was microbiologically followed by contaminating raw chicken with a harmless tracer, as a substitute for Campylobacter. Participants were then interviewed to explore their beliefs with regard to food and food safety. By analyzing videotapes of the food preparation, the microbial contamination of the finished meal, and the interview texts, the relations between behavior and microbial effects and between food related beliefs and behavior are explored, which leads to identification of actual hazards and increased understanding of the relation between behavior and beliefs of consumers. Results and conclusions of this study will be presented, together with implications for future research.