Abstract In recent years there has been an increase in the supply and variety of dairy products with probiotic claims; the objective of this paper was to evaluate the perception and profile of consumers, their beliefs about probiotic effectiveness, consumption habits and their understanding of the information provided on packaging. Through the technique of Word Association, it was observed that the most cited dimension was “sensory characteristics”, which covers the words: appearance, texture and flavour. Nutritional and health-related aspects were significantly frequent for probiotic yoghurt products, being cited mainly by words related to intestinal health. Consumers were found to be unaware some probiotic dairy products. The Attitudinal Questionnaire revealed that consumers do not understand information contained on the labels and attested the high cost of probiotic dairy. It was possible to identify factors that influence perception and buying attitude of consumers.

中文翻译：

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消费者对益生菌乳制品的认知和行为分析

摘要 近年来，具有益生菌功效的乳制品的供应和种类不断增加。本文的目的是评估消费者的认知和特征、他们对益生菌有效性的看法、消费习惯以及他们对包装上提供的信息的理解。通过词联想技术，观察到被引用最多的维度是“感官特征”，它涵盖了词：外观、质地和味道。益生菌酸奶产品的营养和健康相关方面非常频繁，主要被与肠道健康相关的词引用。消费者被发现不知道某些益生菌乳制品。态度问卷显示，消费者不了解标签上的信息，并证明益生菌乳制品的成本很高。可以确定影响消费者感知和购买态度的因素。