THE ROLE OF TIME PREFERENCE, INFORMATION AND HEALTH-ORIENTATION ON CONSUMER FOOD-RELATED BEHAVIOR. SOME EMPIRICAL ANALYSES.

In the last two decades the prevalence of diet-related chronic diseases due to overeating has increased dramatically in many developed and developing countries and forecasts of obesity trends suggest that in 2030 almost 51% of the population will be obese. These data clearly remark the need to find effective ways to tackle the problem. In this context, the thesis aims at studying consumers’ food-related behaviors with a specific focus on the role of time preferences and health-orientation. The work is organized as a collection of four independent studies analyzing different aspects of food behaviors, choices, and preferences. The main objective is to investigate the mechanisms through which time preferences and orientation to health are involved in individuals’ decisions related to food consumption. The thesis also contributes to the literature attempting to propose novel approaches to measure time preferences and health-orientation. The main results indicate that different time preferences are associated with different food preferences and evaluation of product attributes, thus highlighting the need to account for such factor in the economic study of obesity. Similarly, health-orientation affects food-related behaviors. In particular it seems to be positively associated with the use of nutritional information and to be able to affect preferences for different label formats.