'Halo' sweetens cookies and other organic stuff

Thursday, May 2, 2013

A study from the Food & Brand Lab at Cornell University in New York state has implications for food labelling and also shows that "organic" still has cachet, in spite of inroads from the buy-local movement.

Subjects were asked to taste cookies, yogurt and chips, labelled organic and regular, and tell researchers which tasted better. Subjects routinely had more positive thoughts about the organic products, including better taste, higher fibre, less fat and less sugar, but both of the samples were identical, and organic.

Researchers referred to this as the "health halo effect," according to The Globe and Mail. The Cornell study also reported that participants were willing to pay nearly 25 per cent more for the organic products than the regular products.

The study is to be published in the July issue of the journal Food Quality and Preference. BF