Comparative analysis of recent changes in the dietary behavior of Italian and US consumers: The made in Italy market and its factorial conceptualization

Abstract

Recent disruptive events, such as the Covid-19 pandemic, the war in Ukraine and climate change, have intensified the process of ‘deglobalization’ of food consumption. As a result, consumers now prefer locally sourced products. To understand the change in sustainable food consumption in certain countries, this paper analyzes data from a broad survey conducted between 2020 and 2022, during and after the Covid-19 pandemic. The primary goal is to describe an emergent “new normal” culinary ethics based on a preference for regional cuisine, environmental protection and a commitment to health. The analysis compares consumption patterns in Italy and the United States to explore the role of cultural contexts with different but comparable values and principles. Both exploratory and confirmatory factor analyzes are applied to the two subsets of data, drawn from a large survey conducted in 20 countries with nearly 7000 participants, as well as the invariance of their structural parameters through multigroup analysis.