Consumers’ Liking toward Roasted Chestnuts from Fresh and Frozen Nuts. Influence of Psycho-Social Factors and Familiarity with Product.

Three types of roasted chestnuts were obtained by roasting fresh nuts, byroasting frozen nuts or by heating pre-roasted and frozen nuts. A consumerexpectation and liking test was carried out on roasted chestnuts in absence ofinformation about the product processing (blind test), and after information wasgiven (labelled test). Before the test, a questionnaire was presented and demographicand psychographic data were collected. In the blind test consumers expressed thesame liking score toward roasted chestnuts from fresh and frozen nuts and a lowerpreference score toward heated chestnuts from pre-roasted and frozen nuts. Anegative disconfirmation of the expectation (products worse than expected) wasobserved for roasted chestnuts from fresh fruits (traditional products) whilst apositive disconfirmation (products better than expected) for non traditionalproducts. The information on the type of product enhanced the liking toward thetraditional product (positive assimilation) and depleted the liking toward nontraditional products (negative assimilation). The tendency of chestnut consumers todeplete their liking toward non-traditional products is less than that to enhance ittoward the traditional product. The expectations and liking toward both traditionaland non-traditional products were positively correlated to consumer age. Youngerconsumer showed a lower assimilation for roasted chestnuts from frozen nuts only.The product knowledge was negatively correlated to the liking of roasted chestnutsfrom frozen nuts and the attitude toward innovation was positively correlated to theexpectations and the assimilation of information toward non traditional products.[...]