The Study On Consumer’s Food Safety Risk Perception And Prevention Behavior

Starting from the “Sanlu Milk Power” event in 2008, serious food safety events happened continuously in china, which led to the public paying unprecedented attention to food safety risk. With consumers’ confidence in food safety being shaken fundamentally and food safety panic invading the society frequently, food safety risk is becoming one of the biggest social risks in the current china gradually. In fact, many food safety events per se do little harm to society, but they are amplified by some media, especially the intensive report as well as exaggerated hype of online media. This practice has misled consumers and has resulted in their subjective cognition of food safety event often deviating from the actual level of food safety risk, forming the deviation between consumers’ subjective risk cognition and the actual risk level.To rectify consumers’ cognitive deviation of food safety risk and to deal with consumers’ panic to food safety, the effective way is to provide active and valid food safety information. Thus, one important measure to manage china’s food safety is how to establish an effective system for the exchange of food safety risk, that’s to say, how to convey food safety information to consumers scientifically and efficiently according to consumers’ features as well as formation mechanism of the cognition of food safety risk. To address consumers’ cognitive deviation of food safety risk via the way of information disclosure on the basis of consumers’ behavior pattern in searching for food safety information can not only reduce their high-risk cognition towards food safety, but also contain media’s misleading of the public to the extreme, avoiding the emergence and spread of food safety panic. At the same time, it can also provide beneficial reference for the government and corporations to improve their mechanism of releasing food safety information and to construct the mechanism for the exchange of food safety risk, which will have positive and realistic significance to enhance the government’s credibility and to maintain society’s steady development.Based on the perspective of the exchange of food safety risk, the present study first analyzed the relevant theories and then did an empirical research, making the two complementary to each other. On the level of theory analysis, this paper had a multi-dimensional and multi-level literature review from the theories of consumers’ risk cognition theory, information asymmetry theory, information search theory and so on, which laid a theoretical foundation for the subsequent empirical study. On the empirical level, this paper first discussed the general situation of the current food safety event in our country on a macro level from three perspectives: media’s exposure of food safety event, government’s supervision and inspection of food and consumers’ subjective cognition. Then on a micro level, the present study investigated our consumers’ cognition of food safety risk and analyzed the main factors influencing their risk cognition with the theory of planned behavior. Third, the present study analyzed consumers’ information search behavior of food safety, and summarized their features of information search behavior. Besides, dual logistic regression model was employed to study the main factors influencing consumers’ information search behavior of food safety, and fuzzy theory was combined with experimental decision analysis method to recognize the key influencing factors of consumers’ information search behavior. At last, according to consumers’ behavior as well as the relevant theories concerning risk exchange, random N price auction method was used to study consumers’ extra payment behavior towards food with safe information: food with traceable information and food with product quality certification, from which the influence of information’s traceability as well as product quality certification on consumers’ risk cognition can be inferred. Tobit econometric model was also utilized to analyze the influencing factors of consumers’ bid for different safety information.The major conclusions in the present study are as follows:(1) Though the general situation of food safety in china at present is inclined to improve, it is still in a severe situation because media’s report of food safety has caused the deviation between consumers’ subjective cognition of food safety and the actual food safety status.(2) Consumers in china have relatively high-risk cognition of food safety, and most of them lack confidence in our country’s food safety. Among the influencing factors, media’s report on food safety events exerts the biggest influence on consumers’ cognition towards food safety risk, and government’s supervision of food safety has the most remarkable influence on consumers’ risk cognition.(3) Most consumers think that food safety information can reduce their risk perception effectively. Though it is inconvenient for them to get food safety information, they have a strong need for it.(4) The types of food safety information that consumers pay much attention to are shelf life, fresh appearance, pratique message and veterinary drug residue standard. Consumers’ major channel to obtain food safety information are their purchasing experience, product package label, relatives and friends’ introduction, followed by internet, TV, and newspapers and magazines. Among these information sources, consumers trust their own purchasing experience, and relatives and friends’ introduction the most, while their trust in government, consumers’ association, and professional institutes is at the middle level.(5) Among the major factors influencing consumers’ information search behavior of food safety, their education level, attention to food safety, perception of food safety risk, purchasing frequency, attention to health, food quality safety certification and food brand are the seven key factors.(6) Information’s traceability as well as organic quality certification can effectively reduce consumers’ perception of food safety risk. In the process of risk exchange, once the negative information is first released, consumers’ risk perception will be enlarged. Even though the positive information released later is helpful to reduce risk perception, its reduction range is much narrower than the rising range caused by negative information.According to the above research conclusions, this paper put forward some suggestions such as strengthening the supply of food safety information, standardizing media’s report on food safety event.The innovative points in the present study are embodied in the following two aspects. Firstly, proceeding from consumers’ perspective, this paper examined the influence of information’s traceability and organic food certification on consumers’ perception of food safety risk. This paper not only employed foreign scholars’ compensation will as the auction scale value, but also brought in the idea with innovation that negative risk information strengthens consumers’ perception of food safety risk and made a comparison research of information’s traceability and organic food certification’s respective role in the effectiveness of reducing consumers’ perception of food safety risk under different risk information(negative or not) and different information sequences. Secondly, this paper combined fuzzy theory with experimental decision analysis method to recognize the key influencing factors of consumers’ information behavior of food safety for the first time, which is the innovation of research method in the field of consumer behavior. The research conclusions provide references as well as suggestions for the release mechanism of food safety information in our country and the construction of the risk exchange mechanism for food safety.