The food consumption attitudes of the older people in Lithuania

Abstract

Background: “The somatic society\" (Turner, 1992) we live in is saturated with information on healthy life style and nutrition. A particular focus is on bodily ageing and health in later life, mainly stressing the importance of physical activity and diet. But do the older people follow advises of specialists? What food consumption attitudes they have? Do they differ from other age groups? Does gender, education, income level have influence on food consumption attitudes of the elderly? Methods: Various statistical tests and comparative analysis of quantitative data set (N=1847, age 15-74) were applied. The representative data were collected by the market research company “TNS LT” in 2012 in Lithuania. Results: The research revealed that the older persons (60-74) are rather conservative in food consumption. Comparing to younger age groups, they tend to less try new products, foreign kitchen or harmful food, to less taste new drinks. The seniors think more often about calories than the youth. Although the Lithuanian habitants disagree with the proposition “I think that I eat very healthy”, the elderly disagree slightly less than the younger age groups. Conclusions: The food consumption attitudes of Lithuanian older people rather confirm marketers‘ stereotypes (reluctance to try new things) than emerged New-Age Elderly‘s consumption orientation (Sherman et al., 2001) seeking adventure and new experiences.