Abstract There is increasing interest toward insects as an alternative protein source in Western countries even though, so far, most Western consumers react with disgust and rejection. The literature on consumer behavior has mainly investigated the willingness to consume insects with regard to human diet, revealing that providing information about the positive effects of edible insects and using familiar foods while ensuring that insects are not visible will increase the willingness to eat insects. What is still unclear are consumers preferences for specific insect-based products having different features in a non-hypothetical market. The current study analyzed 200 Italian consumers’ preferences for three insect-based products (carriers) such as pasta, cookies and chocolate bars through a non-hypothetical willingness to pay (WTP) elicitation mechanism, the Multiple Price List (MPL), in a mixed within/between experimental design. The influence of the different types of information on consumer choice and the main forces driving consumer preferences for insect-based food were tested. The findings reveal that different carriers generate different results in terms of WTP for conventional and insect-based versions of the products. Further, without being provided information, consumers deem insect-based products either equivalent (the same WTP for the two versions of pasta) or weakly inferior (lower WTP in the case of cookies and chocolate), while when information on the benefits of insect consumption is provided, consumers’ WTP increase for all the insect-based products analyzed. Finally, among the psychographic scales, Food Neophobia and Beliefs and Attitudes toward insects negatively affect the WTP for insect-based products.

中文翻译：

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昆虫食品的支付意愿：信息和载体的作用

摘要 西方国家对昆虫作为替代蛋白质来源的兴趣越来越大，尽管到目前为止，大多数西方消费者的反应都是厌恶和拒绝。关于消费者行为的文献主要研究了人类饮食中食用昆虫的意愿，揭示提供有关食用昆虫的积极影响的信息和使用熟悉的食物，同时确保昆虫不可见会增加食用昆虫的意愿。尚不清楚的是，消费者对在非假设市场中具有不同特征的特定昆虫产品的偏好。目前的研究分析了 200 名意大利消费者对三种昆虫产品（载体）的偏好，例如意大利面、饼干和巧克力棒通过非假设的支付意愿 (WTP) 诱导机制，即多重价格表 (MPL)，在混合实验设计中。测试了不同类型信息对消费者选择的影响以及推动消费者对昆虫食品偏好的主要力量。研究结果表明，不同载体对传统和基于昆虫的产品版本的 WTP 产生不同的结果。此外，在没有被提供信息的情况下，消费者认为昆虫产品要么等效（两种面食的 WTP 相同）或稍逊一筹（饼干和巧克力的 WTP 较低），而当有关昆虫食用益处的信息时提供，消费者对所有分析的基于昆虫的产品的支付意愿增加。最后，