Abstract Duckweed is considered a promising source of protein for human food products due to its high protein content and environmentally friendly production properties. In order to achieve successful inclusion in the diet, duckweed should be presented to consumers in an acceptable way. This paper explores Western consumers’ perceptions towards duckweed as human food and investigates in what contexts duckweed could be acceptable to consumers who are not used to eating it. In a first interview study (N = 10), consumers generally responded positively towards duckweed as human food, although associations with turbid ponds also did come up. According to the respondents, duckweed belonged to the food category vegetables. So, duckweed was considered to fit best in meals where vegetables and greens are expected. In a larger online survey (N = 669), it was confirmed that consumers had a more positive deliberate evaluation of duckweed and were more likely to accept a meal with duckweed if duckweed was applied in a fitting meal. It was also shown that providing information about nutritional and sustainability benefits increased deliberate evaluation and acceptability for fitting meals, but decreased it for non-fitting meals. Automatic evaluations positively influenced deliberate evaluation and acceptability, supporting the ‘yuck’ effect, but they did not differ between the meal applications. The current paper shows that if applied in a meal context that fits with consumer expectations, under the assumption that sensory properties like taste are satisfactory, there appear no major objections from consumers against the introduction of duckweed as human food at a larger scale.

中文翻译：

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浮萍为人类食物。膳食背景和信息对荷兰消费者浮萍可接受性的影响。

摘要 浮萍因其蛋白质含量高和环境友好的生产特性而被认为是人类食品中很有前景的蛋白质来源。为了在饮食中成功加入，浮萍应该以可接受的方式呈现给消费者。本文探讨了西方消费者对浮萍作为人类食物的看法，并调查了在哪些情况下不习惯食用浮萍的消费者可以接受浮萍。在第一次访谈研究（N = 10）中，消费者普遍对浮萍作为人类食物的反应积极，尽管也确实与混浊池塘有关。据受访者介绍，浮萍属于食品类蔬菜。因此，浮萍被认为最适合需要蔬菜和蔬菜的膳食。在更大的在线调查中（N = 669），经证实，消费者对浮萍有更积极的刻意评价，如果在合适的膳食中加入浮萍，则更可能接受含有浮萍的膳食。还表明，提供有关营养和可持续性益处的信息会增加对合适膳食的审慎评估和可接受性，但会降低对不合适膳食的评价。自动评估对故意评估和可接受性产生积极影响，支持“恶心”效应，但它们在膳食应用之间没有差异。目前的论文表明，如果应用于符合消费者期望的膳食环境，在味道等感官特性令人满意的假设下，消费者似乎不会反对将浮萍作为人类食品大规模引入。