The Effect of Social Media on Prepared Food Consumption of Generation X and Y Consumers: A Case Study for Turkey

In line with consumers' ever-increasing workload and time constraints worldwide, prepared food products have started to play an even more prominent role in human life. Thanks to the developing technology, Internet and social media use has increased. Social media has become influential in consumption decisions and growing in popularity and importance among consumers. This study aimed to determine and evaluate the level of prepared food consumption and social media use in Generation X and Generation Y consumers and examine the effect of social media use on prepared food consumption. In this study, Generation Y was chosen because it is the generation that develops with technology and actively uses social media. On the other hand, Generation X is the generation that follows technology behind. The primary material of the research consists of the data collected by the survey conducted on 687 consumers who purchased prepared food products and used social media in Kocaeli, Turkey. The study demonstrated their socio-demographic structure with frequency distributions in the data obtained. In addition, statistical analysis methods (factor analysis, ANOVA test, t-test) were used for data evaluation. A 5-point Likert scale was employed to determine the attitudes of consumers. It was found that prepared food consumption generally increases with the time spent on social media. Generation Y consumers consumed prepared food products more often than Generation X consumers.