via LiveScience
Consumers see a lot of value in organic foods and new research has found that those shoppers are willing to pay a great deal more for that value.
Overall, researchers found that people were willing to pay up to 23.4 percent more for organic foods than they were for the same products not labeled organic. Consumers are willing to pay more for organic foods because of the so-called “health-halo effect,” researchers say.
That effect, where consumers overvalue the benefits of organic foods, was shown in research by Cornell University’s Food and Brand Lab researchers Wan-chen Jenny Lee, Mitsuru Shimizu, Kevin Kniffin and Brian Wansink. In that research, 115 people were recruited from a shopping mall in Ithaca, N.Y.
Each of those shoppers was then asked to evaluate three pairs of products. The catch was that one of those products was labeled organic while the other was not. However, both pairs of yogurt, cookies and potato chips used in the study were identical. Consumers were not able to make the distinction between the products and rated organically labeled food lower in fat, more nutritious, more appetizing and more flavorful. The only difference came when consumers rated cookies not labeled organic as tasting better.
Those attitudes go a long way in explaining why consumers are willing to pay more for organic products than others, researchers say.
MORE . . . .
Via Penn & Teller: Bullshit! – Organic Food – YouTube.
Related articles
- “Health Halo Effect” Of Organic Labels (medicalnewstoday.com)
- Organic labels bias consumers perceptions through the ‘health halo effect’ (eurekalert.org)
- Organic Labels Bias Consumers Perceptions through the “Health halo effect” (seeddaily.com)
New research suggests we may be able to sniff out psychopaths by their poor scores on a smell test.
It is often said that people who talk to themselves must be crazy. This is not necessarily true as a new study has shown. Charles Choi has reported for Live Science 
The supposed 
Your brain may be more likely to recognize new things as new when the unknown is already on your mind, according to new research.
