British Food Journal

An analysis of purchase intentions toward organic food on health consciousness

and food safety with/under structural equation modeling
Shu-Yen Hsu Chiao-Chen Chang Tyrone T. Lin
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BFJ
118,1
200
Received 27 November 2014
Revised 4 October 2015
Accepted 4 October 2015
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British Food Journal
Vol. 118 No. 1, 2016
pp. 200-216
© Emerald Group Publishing Limited
0007-070X
DOI 10.1108/BFJ-11-2014-0376
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/0007-070X.htm
An analysis of purchase
intentions toward organic food on
health consciousness and food
safety with/under structural
equation modeling
Shu-Yen Hsu, Chiao-Chen Chang and Tyrone T. Lin
Department of International Business, National Dong Hwa University,
Hualien, Taiwan
Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the influences of natural content, food safety
concern, health consciousness, and subjective knowledge on attitudes towards organic food and
purchase intentions.
Design/methodology/approach – Samples are collected in Taiwan from April to May 2014 with a
total of 252 returned effective questionnaires. The data are analyzed by structural equation modeling.
Findings – The results show that food safety concern and subjective knowledge have a significantly
positive impact on attitudes towards organic food and purchase intentions, and natural content has a
significantly positive effect on attitudes towards organic food. Moreover, it also shows that health
consciousness and attitudes towards organic food have a significantly positive effect on purchase
intentions. This study has found that subjective knowledge of organic food, health consciousness, and
food safety concern are important factors impacting organic food purchase intentions.
Practical implications – This study provides organic industry to understand the consumer’s
demand from the consumers’ perspective and as a basis for the future development of organic food.
Originality/value – The study results will provide a reference for the agricultural department of the
government and the organic food promotion and education of organic food producers.
Keywords Structural equation modeling, Food safety, Purchase intentions, Organic food,
Health consciousness, Natural content
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
In recent years, the importance of environmental protection and food safety incidents
around the world have raised consumers’ health awareness and caused organic food to
become a focus of public interest. The organic food market is growing fast, and
consumer behaviour has spurred many scholars to conduct research. For example,
Gil et al. (2000) analysed two Spanish regions and people’s willingness to pay a high
premium for organic items in Spain. Williams and Hammitt (2001) questioned 700
conventional and organic food buyers on food safety risks in the Boston area. Gifford and
Bernard (2011) examined the effect of defining “organic” and “natural” on people’s
willingness to pay a premium for organic (vs natural) chicken in Delaware. Thøgersen and
Zhou (2012) studied Chinese consumers’ motivation to buy organic food. Suh et al. (2012)
The authors would like to thank the Ministry of Science and Technology of the Republic of
China, Taiwan for financially supporting this research under Contract No. MOST 101-2410-H-
259-009-MY3.
 explored the influence of Korean consumers’ perceptions and attitudes towards organic Health
food on their willingness to buy it. consciousness
In 2012, there were approximately 1.9 million organic food producers, of which
Asia accounts for 36 per cent, Africa comprises 30 per cent, and Europe makes up
and food
17 per cent (Patil, 2015). This paper uses literature reviews and the opinions of safety
Taiwanese consumers to perform an empirical study, beginning with Asian and
Taiwanese perspectives, in order to understand consumers’ attitudes and the factors 201
that influence their purchase intentions towards organic food. In Hong Kong,
environmental factors and organic food knowledge were found to be important
elements that affect consumers’ attitudes towards organic food, but health
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consciousness did not affect the beliefs of Hong Kong youth (Cheung et al., 2015).
In Malaysia, youths’ knowledge of organic food was the main factor that affected their
purchase intentions towards it (Thambiah et al., 2015).
In recent years, there have been a number of food safety incidents in Taiwan that
caused the Department of Health and Welfare to revise the Act Governing Food Safety
and Sanitation seven times in six years, from 2010 to 2015. The agricultural
department’s food tracking systems, establishment of production records, and certification
process of organic food became more stringent. Consumers are now able to clearly
see a product’s ingredients, origin, producer, manufacturing date, expiration date,
and the company responsible for the product, as well as the entire process. All this
information is available to the public, which will greatly help consumers know more about
organic food and increase their positive attitudes. Organic information labels have
significantly influenced Taiwanese consumers’ trust in organic food, which in turn
affected their opinions of it and purchase intentions (Teng and Wang, 2015).

Research motivation and purpose

The current research on organic food – such as Denver and Christensen (2015),
Hasselbach and Roosen (2015), Lockie et al. (2002), Mallory et al. (2015), Paoletti (2014), and
Azak and Miran (2015) – is mostly from Europe and America. There is a lack of related
research on organic food in Asia; thus, we include a perspective from Asia and Taiwan to
determine the influence of consumers’ doubts about whether manufacturers provide
honest ingredient labels, given the series of global food safety incidents. This paper also
explores the effect of consumers’ subjective knowledge of organic food on their food
choices, which tend to be about food that is healthier and contains natural ingredients.
The main purposes of this study are as follows: first, to examine the main factors that
push consumers to purchase organic food given the rise of the healthy diet concept, and
people’s more in-depth understanding of organic food given frequent food safety
incidents. Second, to investigate the influence of consumers’ food safety concerns and
health consciousness on organic food purchase intentions in different spatial-temporal
environments based on previous academic studies. Third, to provide a perspective from
Taiwan and Asia, as well as a reference for the government’s agricultural department
and organic food producers’ education and promotion of organic food.

Literature review and hypothesis development

Natural content
In this study, “natural content” refers to food without any artificial colouring or food
additives added during processing, thus maintaining the original essence of
raw materials, and manufacturing without excessive processing conditions. Typical
 BFJ consumers of organic food tend to gravitate towards labels such as “pesticide-free”,
118,1 “hormone-free”, “no chemicals”, “no pollutants”, “no antibiotics”, “no GMOs”; such
foods are thus “natural” (Essoussi and Zahaf, 2009). Consumers preferring organic over
local food put relatively higher value on the motives of natural content and animal
welfare (Hasselbach and Roosen, 2015).
In Taiwan, consumer food choice motives such as mood, convenience, natural content,
202 animal welfare, environmental protection, political values, and religion positively affect
people’s attitudes about organic food; in turn, this affects their purchase intentions
(Chen, 2007). In addition, consumers are willing to pay higher prices for natural food
brands, which cause manufacturers to place labels on their products that state they have
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natural content (Heeres et al., 2013). According to the Wireless News (2013) survey, when
buying food and beverages, more than 70 per cent of consumers pay special attention to
labels that indicate items have natural content, without artificial ingredients, and are
organic or without artificial colouring. Thus, this study expects that consumers’ beliefs
about the natural content of organic food have a significantly positive effect on purchase
intentions. Hence, H1a and H1b are developed as follows:
H1a. Natural content has a positive effect on attitudes towards organic food.
H1b. Natural content has a positive effect on organic food purchase intentions.
Health consciousness
In this study, “health consciousness” refers to consumers’ understanding of health status
changes and the degree of emphasis on health requirements. Many consumers believe that
organic food contains higher levels of nutrients (Hill and Lynchehaun, 2002). Compared
with non-organic food, organic food contains higher levels of vitamin C, iron, magnesium,
phosphorus, as well as lower nitrates and pesticide residues. It is certify that the health
benefit of organic milk has a good effect on restraining atopic dermatitis (Crinnion, 2010).
Past studies have shown consumers that buy organic food are more responsible for
their health, health and food safety are the two chief reasons why consumers opt for
organic products (Van Loo et al., 2010; Sirieix et al., 2011; Huber et al., 2011).
The primary motives consumers provide include staying healthy, being chemical-free
and environment friendly, and that organic food is more delicious (Hill and
Lynchehaun, 2002). Cancer is one of the top ten fatal diseases and children’ allergy rates
have been increasing; people believe these ailments relate to the environment, pesticide
residues, and food additives. In Taiwan, people in poor health or who take care of
acutely or chronically ill family members favour the healthful attributes of choosing
agricultural produce; all contribute to an individual’s intake of organic food (Tung et al.,
2015). Therefore, this paper expects that consumers’ health consciousness will
significantly affect their attitudes and purchase intentions for organic food. Therefore,
H2a and H2b are developed as follows:
H2a. Health consciousness has a positive effect on attitudes towards organic food.
H2b. Health consciousness has a positive effect on organic food purchase intentions.

Food safety concern

In this study, “food safety concern” refers to the degree of consumers’ anxiety
regarding the quality of processed foods, food additives, and pesticide residues that
could jeopardize their physical health. Consumers’ need for information about food
quality and production methods is increasing (Ureña et al., 2008). In China, food safety
 is a national crisis and threatens the physical and psychological health of Chinese Health
citizens, despite that strict food safety laws are repeatedly passed (Veeck et al., 2015). consciousness
Many studies have examined food safety and the influence on consumers’
willingness to pay a premium for organic food (Baker, 1999; Grunert, 2005; Krystallis
and food
and Chryssohoidis, 2005). Food safety is receiving more and more attention in safety
developing countries, consumers’ awareness of food safety information and the
analysis of food demand are closely related (Obayelu et al., 2014). 203
Hence, consumers are paying more attention to health, quality, and the ingredients
of what they ingest (Gil et al., 2000; Winter and Davis, 2006; Suh et al., 2012). When
consumers are facing pregnancy, illness, food-borne diseases, and other special
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circumstances, they will choose to buy organic food (Richter, 2005). However, food
safety concern is the most important factor in predicting one’s willingness to buy
organic food (Michaelidou and Hassan, 2008). Therefore, this study expects that
consumers’ food safety concerns will positively affect their attitudes and purchase
intentions. H3a and H3b are outlined as follows:
H3a. Food safety concerns has a positive effect on attitudes towards organic food.
H3b. Food safety concerns has a positive effect on organic food purchase intentions.
Subjective knowledge of organic food
Organic food includes crops grown without using non-natural chemicals such as
pesticides and chemical fertilizers, and without any use of radiation, industrial solvents,
or chemical additives (Allen and Albala, 2007). In this study, “subjective knowledge of
organic food” refers to consumers’ knowledge of organic food quality and related
understanding. Compared with Taiwanese consumers, Indonesian consumers have
greater knowledge and a positive attitude towards organic rice (Moslehpour et al., 2014).
Past studies about views on the consumption of organic food found that subjective
knowledge has a notable effect on purchasing it (Gracia and de Magistris, 2007; Pieniak
et al., 2010; Suh et al., 2012). When the consumers have more knowledge about organic
foods, this will have a positive impact on their perspectives of it and the frequency with
which they consume it (Aertsens et al., 2011). Thus, this study expects that the greater
consumers’ subjective knowledge of organic food, the better their attitudes towards it and
the higher their purchase intentions will be. Hence H4a and H4b are developed as
follows：
H4a. Subjective knowledge of organic food has a positive effect on attitudes
towards organic food.
H4b. Subjective knowledge of organic food has a positive effect on organic food
purchase intentions.
Attitudes towards organic food and purchase intentions
Some studies have pointed out that a significant difference between consumers’
opinions of organic food and their real purchase behaviour (Hughner et al., 2007;
Magnusson et al., 2001). In Hong Kong, consumers had a negative attitude and low
purchase intention towards organic food from China; in Shanghai, consumers did not
especially prefer it to organic items produced elsewhere (Yip and Janssen, 2015). People
believe that organic products do not have pesticide residue, do not contain common
food additives, or were excessively processed and have a more positive view of organic
than traditional food will increase their purchase intentions (Williams and Hammitt,
2000, 2001; Yee et al., 2005). Furthermore, the previous researches proposed that
 BFJ attitudes towards organic food have a positive effect on purchase intentions
118,1 (Michaelidou and Hassan, 2008; Kim and Chung, 2011; Pino et al., 2012). Hence H5 is
developed as follows:
H5. Attitudes towards organic food have a positive effect on purchase intentions.
Base on the previous literature review, this study constructs the research framework as
204 shown in Figure 1.

Methodology
Questionnaire design
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This study employed the research framework by Michaelidou and Hassan (2008) as the
basis for predicting attitudes and purchase intentions towards organic food. This study
also took into account the current situation of Taiwan’s overall food safety
environment and organic food development.
The questionnaire used a seven-point scale (Likert, 1932), when developing the
research framework, the role of food safety concern, health consciousness, and
purchase intentions proposed by Michaelidou and Hassan (2008), the role about natural
content stated by Steptoe et al. (1995), the role of attitudes towards organic food
suggested by Gil et al. (2000), and the role of subjective knowledge of organic
food projected by Pieniak et al. (2010). The six roles are developed as the dimensions of
the questionnaire to investigate the influences of natural content, food safety concern,
health consciousness, and subjective knowledge of organic food on consumers’ organic
food attitudes and purchase intentions in Taiwan.

Natural Content

H1b
H
1a

H2b

Health Consciousness
H2a

Attitudes Towards H5
Purchase Intention
Organic Food

a
H3

Food Safety Concern H3b

H4b
4a
H

Subjective Knowledge

Figure 1.
Research framework Notes: 2=376.4; p - value = 0.000; df = 174; 2/ df = 2.163; GFI = 0.876; AGFI = 0.835;
RMSEA = 0.068; CFI = 0.953
 As for questionnaire design, aside from referring to the surveys carried out by the Health
aforementioned researchers during development, three of Taiwan’s food industry consciousness
executive managers and two expert scholars also assessed it. They did so to confirm
that the dimensions and questions were in line with Taiwan’s current development of
and food
its organic food industry, that the survey could effectively measure consumers’ real safety
feelings, and to proceed with the distribution of the pre-test questionnaire.
205
Sampling procedure
A pre-test typically involves a few experienced interviewers completing around
25-75 interviews (Oksenberg et al., 1991). This study distributed the pre-test
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questionnaires from 1-15 March 2014, and targeted the main food purchaser of each
household. This study distributed 100 pre-test questionnaires, and 75 effective ones
were returned, for a recovery rate of 75 per cent. The Cronbach’s α of each dimension
was greater than 0.7. The item-to-total-correction score was greater than 0.5; hence, the
questionnaire had good internal consistency and reliability. Based on these results, this
study formally administered the questionnaire.
Almost 60 per cent of the top five organic food stores are located in the northern area of
Taiwan, because the prices in organic food stores are much higher than the traditional
food stores, and costumers in the northern area are more capable in consuming expensive
food products. Thus, the research is based on assumption that organic food stores in the
northern area will take up to 70 per cent of the business volume. The survey is conducted
by the ratio. This paper employed sampling through MySurvey.com to connect with social
networks such as Facebook and LINE from 25 April to 25 May 2014, with 227 effective
copies. Moreover, this study collected data through personal interviews, with
25 effective copies. Overall, this study gathered 252 effective copies.
Using structural equation modeling (SEM) analysis, the smallest sample
requirement was 100-150 (Ding et al., 1995). Based on the estimations using the
method of maximum likelihood, the sample variable and sample size ratio of 1:10 is
the smallest requirement for sample size ( Jackson, 2003). This study contains 21
sample variables and 252 effective samples, which are greater than the above
guidelines for minimum sample size for SEM.

Data analysis
Sample characteristics
The participants consisted of 156 women (61.9 per cent) and 96 men (38.1 per cent)
between 41 and 50 years old (34.5 per cent), followed by 31-40 (30.2 per cent). In terms of
monthly income, 40.1 per cent earn TWD 20,001-50,000. Most participants live in the north
(70.2 per cent). The majority of respondents are married with children (48 per cent).
As for educational background, 46.8 per cent went to college, and 46.4 per cent attended
graduate school. As for occupation, most participants work in the service industry
(40.5 per cent).
Based on the sample data, it is show that most participants are females between
41 and 50 years old, with a high educational background, married with children, and
are the main breadwinners and decision makers of food purchases in Taiwan’s
northern urban area. The results suggest this is representative of households with a
high-educational background in the urban area, which tend to favour natural content,
food safety concern, and health consciousness. They also tend to have subjective
knowledge of organic food and positive purchase intentions towards it.
 BFJ The analysis of reliability and validity
118,1 This study proposes that Cronbach’s α should be above 0.7 (Cronbach, 1951).
The Cronbach’s α coefficients for the dimensions are 0.865, 0.945, 0.873, 0.899, 0.828,
and 0.948, respectively, all of which are higher than 0.7. Meanwhile, the composite
reliability (CR) values for the dimensions are 0.873, 0.941, 0.88, 0.908, 0.819, and 0.95,
respectively, and the higher the value, the higher internal consistency of variables.
206 The average variance extract (AVE) is to state how much variance captured by the
latent variable among other variables in the dimension. The higher AVE’s values are,
the observed variables can react more latent trait common factor between dimensions.
AVE values for the dimensions are 0.699, 0.762, 0.714, 0.768, 0.538, and 0.864,
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respectively, as shown in Table I. The CR and AVE have reached the standard and
correspond to the suggestion by Fornell and Larcker (1981) and Hair et al. (2009), CR is
supposed to be higher than 0.7, AVE is higher than 0.5, and the correlation of
consistency and convergent validity have proved to be existing in all dimensions.
Except the factor loading (λ) in the question of “organic food is delicious” gets the value
of 0.599, the rest of the values of the questions are over 0.6. Hence, the six dimensions of
the model proved good convergent validity.
This study uses AVE to scrutinize the discriminant validity of all dimensions.
AVE’s square roots are higher than Pearson’s correlation coefficients among
all dimensions, which prove that discriminant validity exists among dimensions
(Fornell and Larcker, 1981), as shown in Table II.

The analysis of the sample with SEM

To verify the goodness of fit in this study, the model is conducted by the following
indicators: χ2, the value of χ2 and degree of freedom ( χ2/df), goodness of fit index (GFI),
adjusted goodness of fit index (AGFI), root mean square error of approximation
(RMSEA), and comparative fit index (CFI). The larger value of χ2 indicates that the model
does not fit because χ2 is easily influenced by the number of sample. Therefore,
Kline (2011) suggested to use the value of χ2 and degree of freedom as the indicator to
verify the goodness of fit. When the value is smaller than 3, it shows that the model has
better goodness of fit. When the values of GFI and AGFI are between 0 and 1, it shows
that the predicted model and the sample have ideal goodness of fit, especially when the
value of CFI is close to 1. Doll et al. (1994) and MacCallum and Hong (1997) suggested when
the values of GFI and AGFI are over 0.8, it shows that the model has proper goodness of
fit. Schumacker and Lomax (2004) suggested that the model has suitable goodness of fit
when RMSEA falls between 0.05 and 0.08. In the model of this study, χ2 ¼ 376.4,
χ2/df ¼ 2.163, GFI ¼ 0.876, AGFI ¼ 0.835, RMSEA ¼ 0.068, and CFI ¼ 0.953. Based on the
Figure 1, the indicators of the model in this study have reached the verification.
In the past, the Causal step approach (Baron and Kenny, 1986) and Sobel test (Sobel,
1982, 1986) were usually adopted to test the mediation effect. Hayes (2009) pointed out
that the Sobel test is usually to compensate the insufficiency of the Causal step
approach. However, the Sobel test needs the assumption of the sample distribution of
an indirect effect as the normal distribution. The regular sample distribution is not
symmetrical, and its skewness and kurtosis are not 0 (Bollen and Stine, 1990; Stone and
Sobel, 1990). This study adopts bootstrapping to analyze the effect of the mediator
variable. This study constructs the dimension of attitudes towards organic food as the
mediator variable to explore the dimensions of natural content, health consciousness,
food safety concern, and subjective knowledge of organic food with relation to
purchase intentions. As shown in Table V the results showed that natural content, food
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Model parameter estimates Item reliability Residuals Convergent validity

Construct Item Unstd. SE t-value p Std. SMC 1-SMC CR AVE

NTRLCNT NT1-1 1 0.896 0.803 0.197 0.873 0.699

NT1-2 0.672 0.052 12.976 *** 0.714 0.510 0.490
NT1-3 1.016 0.056 18.176 *** 0.885 0.783 0.217
HLTH HH3_1 1 0.926 0.857 0.143 0.941 0.762
HH3_2 1.042 0.04 26.012 *** 0.92 0.846 0.154
HH3_3 0.96 0.035 27.621 *** 0.94 0.884 0.116
HH3_4 0.823 0.047 17.357 *** 0.789 0.623 0.377
HH3_5 0.782 0.047 16.758 *** 0.773 0.598 0.402
FSCERN FS2_1 1 0.684 0.468 0.532 0.880 0.714
FS2_2 1.638 0.127 12.855 *** 0.948 0.899 0.101
FS2_3 1.538 0.122 12.639 *** 0.88 0.774 0.226
KNWGE KN4_1 1 0.872 0.760 0.240 0.908 0.768
KN4_2 1.093 0.054 20.302 *** 0.943 0.889 0.111
KN4_3 1.094 0.068 16.135 *** 0.81 0.656 0.344
ATTIT AT5_1 1 0.793 0.629 0.371 0.819 0.538
AT5_2 1.088 0.073 14.914 *** 0.888 0.789 0.211
AT5_4 0.676 0.073 9.264 *** 0.599 0.359 0.641
AT5_8 0.835 0.088 9.528 *** 0.611 0.373 0.627
PRCHSEINTN PI6_1 1 0.971 0.943 0.057 0.950 0.864
PI6_2 0.985 0.027 37.001 *** 0.961 0.924 0.076
PI6_3 0.901 0.039 22.933 *** 0.851 0.724 0.276
Notes: NTRLCNT, natural content; HLTH, health consciousness; FSCERN, food safety concern; KNWGE, subjective knowledge ; ATTIT, attitudes towards
organic food; PRCHSEINTN, purchase intentions
consciousness

safety
Health

and food

confirmatory factors
Analysis of
Table I.
207
 BFJ KNWGE FSCERN HLTH NTRLCNT ATTIT PRCHSEINTN
118,1
KNWGE 0.876
FSCERN 0.336 0.845
HLTH 0.504 0.498 0.873
NTRLCNT 0.466 0.215 0.354 0.836
ATTIT 0.512 0.398 0.372 0.629 0.733
208 PRCHSEINTN 0.546 0.467 0.512 0.407 0.527 0.930
Notes: NTRLCNT, natural content; HLTH, health consciousness; FSCERN, food safety concern;
Table II. KNWGE, subjective knowledge; ATTIT, attitudes towards organic food; PRCHSEINTN, purchase
Discriminant validity intentions. Square root of AVE in italics on diagonals. Off diagonals are Pearson correlation of constructs
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safety concern, and subjective knowledge of organic food have positive significant
effects on attitudes towards organic food. And attitudes towards organic food, health
consciousness, food safety concern, and subjective knowledge of organic food show a
significantly positive relation to purchase intentions. Nevertheless, health
consciousness and attitudes towards organic food have an insignificantly negative
relation. The R2 value in the dimension of attitudes towards organic food in the model
is 0.501, whereas the R2 value in the dimension of purchase intentions in the model is
0.459. Both figures show that the model is explanatory.

Empirical results
Mediation effect analysis
As shown in Table III, the structural model has shown that attitudes towards organic
food have a significantly indirect effect on natural content and purchase intentions, but
the direct effect is insignificant. The result shows the mediation effect of attitudes
towards organic food on natural content has a complete mediation effect on purchase
intentions. Consumers’ favour to natural content is through good attitudes towards
organic food, which will have a positive effect on purchase intentions towards organic
food. However, health consciousness has an insignificant indirect effect on purchase
intentions, and attitudes towards organic food on health consciousness have no
mediation effect on purchase intentions. Based on the raise of health consciousness, it
affects purchase intentions towards organic food directly. Attitudes towards organic
food on food safety concern and subjective knowledge towards purchase intentions
have both significantly indirect and direct effects. It indicates that attitudes towards
organic food have a partly mediation effect on food safety concern and subjective
knowledge to purchase intentions.
The findings of this study are not correspondent with the study conducted by
Michaelidou and Hassan (2008), which found that health consciousness and food safety
concern have no significantly effect on purchase intentions towards organic food. The
mediation effects between the two studies are not the same on health consciousness
and food safety concern to purchase intentions.

Hypothesis results
The results of the hypothesis verification of all dimensions are shown in Table IV.
Health consciousness and attitudes towards organic food show an insignificant
negative relation; natural content and purchase intentions also indicate an insignificant
positive relation (H1b and H2a were not supported).
 Bootstrapping
Health
Product of Bias-corrected Percentile consciousness
coefficients 95% CI 95% CI and food
Variable Point estimate SE Z Lower Upper Lower Upper p-Value (two tailed)
safety
Total effects (unstandardized)
NTRLCNT –
PRCHSEINTN 0.13 0.05 2.43 0.03 0.24 0.02 0.24 0.02* 209
HLTH –
PRCHSEINTN 0.21 0.07 2.82 0.07 0.36 0.07 0.36 0.01**
FSCERN –
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PRCHSEINTN 0.47 0.13 3.78 0.24 0.74 0.24 0.74 0.00**

KNWGE –
PRCHSEINTN 0.34 0.07 4.72 0.19 0.47 0.20 0.47 0.00**
Indirect effects (unstandardized)
NTRLCNT –
PRCHSEINTN 0.10 0.04 2.39 0.03 0.19 0.03 0.19 0.02*
HLTH –
PRCHSEINTN −0.01 0.02 −0.35 −0.05 0.03 −0.05 0.03 0.73
FSCERN –
PRCHSEINTN 0.10 0.05 2.17 0.03 0.23 0.03 0.21 0.03*
KNWGE –
PRCHSEINTN 0.06 0.03 1.93 0.01 0.13 0.01 0.12 0.05*
Direct effects (unstandardized)
NTRLCNT –
PRCHSEINTN 0.03 0.06 0.52 −0.09 0.16 -0.10 0.16 0.60
HLTH –
PRCHSEINTN 0.22 0.07 3.01 0.08 0.36 0.08 0.36 0.00**
FSCERN –
PRCHSEINTN 0.37 0.12 2.97 0.13 0.62 0.13 0.62 0.00**
KNWGE –
PRCHSEINTN 0.28 0.07 3.77 0.13 0.42 0.13 0.42 0.00** Table III.
Notes: NTRLCNT, natural content; HLTH, health consciousness; FSCERN, food safety concern; Mediation effect of
KNWGE, subjective knowledge; PRCHSEINTN, purchase intentions hypothesized model

Support
Hypothesis (yes/no)

H1a Natural content has a positive effect on attitudes towards organic food Yes
H1b Natural content has a positive effect on organic food purchase intentions No
H2a Health consciousness has a positive effect on attitudes towards organic food No
H2b Health consciousness has a positive effect on organic food purchase intentions Yes
H3a Food safety concern has a positive effect on attitudes towards organic food Yes
H3b Food safety concern has a positive effect on organic food purchase intentions Yes
H4a Subjective knowledge of organic food has a positive effect on attitudes towards Yes
organic food
H4b Subjective knowledge of organic food has a positive effect on organic food purchase Yes
intentions Table IV.
H5 Attitudes towards organic food have a positive effect on purchase intentions Yes Hypothesis result
 BFJ The finding shows that food safety concern, subjective knowledge, and natural
118,1 content are significantly positively related to attitudes towards organic food.
Moreover, health consciousness, food safety concern, subjective knowledge, and
attitudes towards organic food have significantly positively effects on purchase
intentions. These results validate H1a, H2b, H3a, H3b, H4a, H4b, and H5. They
also show that food safety incidents happen in an endless stream, and the raise
210 of health consciousness and the favour of natural content make organic farming
increasing sharply within five years. The subjective knowledge of organic food
and consumers’ attitudes towards organic food are positively related to purchase
intentions.
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Comparing the important effects of each independent variable on dependent

variable, according to Table V, the standardized β coefficient shows that the effect of
natural content on attitudes towards organic food is 0.49, which is the most significant.
The standardized β coefficient of subjective knowledge of organic food on purchase
intentions is 0.25; both that of food safety concern on attitudes towards organic food
and that of attitudes towards organic food on purchase intentions are 0.23.
The standardized β coefficient of subjective knowledge of organic food on attitudes
towards organic food is 0.22, and both those of health consciousness and food safety
concern on purchase intentions are 0.19, which is relatively small. However, health
consciousness and food safety concern have a significantly direct effect on purchase
intentions. Thus, both dimensions are important factors to predict the purchase
intentions towards organic food.
Then ANOVA analysis and the comparison of the effects of various demographic
variables on purchase intentions are made. The result shows that among demographic
variables, age ( p-value ¼ 0.000) and average monthly income ( p-value ¼ 0.012)
are the variables that are significantly positively related to purchase intentions,
while other variables prove to be insignificantly related to purchase intentions. The
analysis conducted by Scheffe (1959) post hoc with regard to the effects of age and
monthly income on purchase intentions towards organic food finds that the age
between 41 and 50 has a significantly higher effect than the ages between 21-30 and 31-
40. The monthly income group over TWD 100,000 has a prominently higher effect than
the monthly income group under TWD 20,000.

Regression path В β SE CR p-value

ATTIT ← HLTH −0.02 −0.03 0.06 −0.40 0.691

ATTIT ← FSCERN 0.35 0.23 0.10 3.46 ***
ATTIT ← KNWGE 0.19 0.22 0.06 3.12 **
ATTIT ← NTRLCNT 0.33 0.49 0.05 6.77 ***
PRCHSEINTN ← ATTITUDES 0.30 0.23 0.11 2.77 **
PRCHSEINTN ← HLTH 0.22 0.19 0.07 2.93 **
PRCHSEINTN ← FSCERN 0.37 0.19 0.13 2.93 **
PRCHSEINTN ← KNWGE 0.28 0.25 0.08 3.69 ***
PRCHSEINTN ← NTRLCNT 0.03 0.04 0.07 0.51 0.611
Notes: NTRLCNT, natural content; HLTH, health consciousness; FSCERN, food safety concern; KNWGE,
subjective knowledge; ATTIT, attitudes towards organic food; PRCHSEINTN, purchase intentions.
Table V. R2 (attitudes) ¼ 0.501, R2 (purchase intentions) ¼ 0.459. Goodness of fit statistic: χ2 ¼ 376.4, χ2/df ¼ 2.163,
Result of final model GFI ¼ 0.876, AGFI ¼ 0.835, RMSEA ¼ 0.068, CFI ¼ 0.953. *po0.05; **po0.01; ***po0.001
 Conclusions Health
With the development of biotechnology and the advancement of food processing consciousness
techniques, consumers are conscious of over-processing and additives in food.
Furthermore, a series of food safety incidents has raised awareness of the healthy
and food
diet concept and health consciousness. Nowadays, pursuing natural content without safety
additives has become mainstream. Based on the results, this study discusses
the theoretical and practical implications and provides specific suggestions, 211
as outlined below.

Theoretical implications
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The results show that consumers’ increased subjective knowledge of organic food
positively influenced their opinions and purchase intentions towards it, which is
consistent with Gracia and de Magistris (2007), Suh et al. (2012). Since Taiwan only began
developing its organic farming industry in the last 20 years, consumers there have less
knowledge of organic food. Increasing the promotion of organic food in order to establish
correct knowledge and concepts of it will help develop the organic food industry.
The result that health consciousness is an important factor in purchase
intentions corresponds to research by Padel and Foster (2005) and Magnusson et al.
(2003). However, this outcome differs from a study by Michaelidou and Hassan
(2008), who found that health consciousness and food safety concerns had no
significant effect on purchase intentions towards organic food. The possible reasons
for the differences between the two studies include the research targets, regions,
and time differences.
Based on the responses we received to the statement: “Nowadays, most foods
contain residues from chemical sprays and fertilizers”, the average score rose to 6.10,
and the average score for the item “I am very concerned about the amount of artificial
additives and preservatives in food” was 5.94. This shows that the respondents were
concerned about current food safety, and that consumers believe organic food does not
use pesticides, chemical fertilizer residues, and pollutants. With the promotion of
organic food and the increase in organic farming in Taiwan, it is more convenient for
people to buy organic food. Consumers who emphasize health consciousness do not
necessarily think organic food is the best choice, but would still like to increase their
purchase of it.
This study found that the natural content in organic food had the greatest influence
on consumers’ opinions of it. The results, which state that natural content influence
consumers’ views and purchase intentions towards organic food, are consistent with
Chen (2007). In recent years, most food safety incidents in Taiwan were caused by the
irresponsible use of additives, or by the illegal use of industrial additives. These
occurrences have caused consumers to doubt the safety of processed food; meanwhile,
they believe that organic food does not include artificial colouring and additives,
thus retaining a natural flavour. This positively impacted their attitudes
towards organic food.

Practical implications
Although the definition of organic farming varies across countries, it mainly aims to
increase biological diversity and soil activity, and reduce environmental pollution and
the danger to animals caused by farming. These goals can be accomplished by
reducing the use of pesticides and chemical fertilizers. Environmental protection and
animal welfare are the starting points of development in organic farming.
 BFJ In recent years, food safety problems have occurred frequently around the world,
118,1 and consumers are more aware of food safety and health consciousness. Therefore,
in 2007, major changes were implemented in organic agricultural regulations in Taiwan
from the consumer’s perspective, such as changes in mandatory labelling and
compulsory certifications for organic food. These measures will decrease the chance of
consumers buying fake organic products, and grow their trust in organic food
212 producers, thus contributing to the promotion of organic food.
Since Taiwan’s organic farming industry mainly involves small-scale farms, the
cost of compulsory certification is too high for small-scale farmers, thus increasing
their economic burden, while mandatory labelling will raise the barriers to entry for
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organic food producers. The agricultural department should carefully assess how
to protect consumers from buying fake organic products. At the same time, it should
consider the economic burden on Taiwan’s small-scale farmers of investing in
organic farming.
This study explores the factors that influence consumers’ attitudes and purchase
intentions towards organic food from the consumers’ perspective, and provides
suggestions to the agricultural department and organic food producers, which can be
used as a reference for developing the organic food industry.

Suggestions
The development and growth of the organic food industry depends on cooperation
among government departments, organic food producers, and distributors. We suggest
the following for government departments and organic food producers:
(1) The agricultural department should conduct regular promotions and trainings
for organic food products so as to strengthen producers’ sense of responsibility
in terms of food safety. Promotions will smoothen the distribution pipelines for
producers, thus greatly reducing exploitation by intermediaries so that
consumers can have greater access to organic foods.
(2) Lowering the certification costs of organic food and increasing farmers’
motivation to produce them will increase the amount of farming areas for it.
This will eventually reduce the chance of organic food being contaminated by
its surroundings, while also guaranteeing its safety and increasing organic
agricultural production.
(3) Organic food producers should actively develop organic tourist farms so that
consumers will be able to directly see the production process. Through direct
contact with organic food producers, consumers’ knowledge of organic food will
increase, and they will trust producers more. All of these will greatly develop
consumers’ positive attitudes towards organic food, thus influencing their
purchase intentions.
Our findings will provide a reference for the agricultural department, organic farm
producers, and dealers and retailers to understand the effect of consumers’ beliefs and
subjective knowledge on their purchase intentions.
The results can serve as a reference for organic food promotion and education
to raise organic farmers’ income, and encourage more young people to devote
themselves to organic farming in order to ease the serious aging problem in rural
villages. Moreover, our results can protect the environment from pesticides and
chemical fertilizers.
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About the authors

Shu-Yen Hsu is a PhD Student at the Department of International Business, National Dong Hwa
University and has 18 years experience in food industry. Shu-Yen Hsu is the corresponding
author and can be contacted at: 810232010@ems.ndhu.edu.tw
Chiao-Chen Chang is an Associate Professor at the Department of International Business,
National Dong Hwa University, Hualien, Taiwan. Her current research focuses on electronic
commerce, internet marketing and consumer behaviour.
Tyrone T. Lin is a Professor at the Department of International Business, National Dong Hwa
University, Hualien, Taiwan. His current research focuses on decision science, green and
environmental economics,international financial management.

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