Food Policy 52 (2015) 7583

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Food Policy
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/foodpol

Trust and willingness to pay for nanotechnology food

J. Roosen a,, A. Bieberstein a, S. Blanchemanche b, E. Goddard c, S. Marette b, F. Vandermoere d
a

}nchen, Freising, Germany

TUM School of Management, Technische Universitt Mu
UMR Economie Publique, INRA, Paris, France
c
Department of Resource Economics and Environmental Sociology, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada
d
Department of Sociology, Antwerp University, Antwerp, Belgium
b

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history:
Available online 20 January 2015
Keywords:
Evaluation
Nanotechnology
One-and-a-half-bound dichotomous choice
Self-protection
Trust
Willingness to pay

a b s t r a c t
We analyze the role of trust in the evaluation of a new food technology, namely nanotechnology. A literature review in the social and economic sciences reveals that many different trust concepts are available.
The economics literature suggests that trust can lead to lower efforts of self-protecting behavior. Translating this concept into the framework of willingness to pay (WTP) for food products allows for the derivation of hypotheses on the workings of trust. We show that WTP for new food characteristics increases
with trust also when new information about the technology is revealed. The results are conrmed with
online survey data for Canada and Germany and experimental data in Germany.
2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Introduction
The development of integrated, long supply chains and some
food technologies has made modern food businesses more vulnerable to safety incidents and consumer trust in the food industry
has been challenged by a series of scandals. Consumers have
become skeptical of food innovations and industrialization. Even
when responding to the growing demand for convenience and
safety, the successful introduction of new food technologies has
become a major challenge.
It has been shown that trust is a construct that helps people to
accept risks in the face of moral hazard. Hence, trust contributes to
economic progress (Arrow, 1974). However, despite this recognized importance of trust in the economics literature, most original
contributions and those that operationalize trust as a measurement construct have come from the eld of other social sciences,
such as sociology (e.g., Luhmann, 1968/2000; Giddens, 1990). Here
trust is a source of social capital that helps to reduce complexity
and to facilitate interaction. Giddens (1990), for example, posits
that trust in expert systems is a mechanism to reduce complexity:
when a laypersons knowledge is inadequate, the person will retain
his or her ontological security by trusting experts. In a context of
food safety crises and the development of new food technologies,
trust is considered to be a key concept (Berg, 2004; de Jonge
Corresponding author at: TUM School of Management, Marketing and Consumer Research, Alte Akademie 16, 85350 Freising, Germany. Tel.: +49 8161 71
3318; fax: +49 8161 71 4501.
E-mail address: jroosen@tum.de (J. Roosen).
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.foodpol.2014.12.004
0306-9192/ 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

et al., 2008; Frewer et al., 1996; Kjrnes et al., 2007; Renn and
Rohrmann, 2000; Sassatelli and Scott, 2001).
The objectives of this paper are twofold. From extant literature,
denitions of trust are reviewed with regard to food technologies
and an attempt is made to relate trust to consumers willingness
to pay (WTP) for altered food characteristics. Secondly, the
relationship between trust and WTP is assessed for a new food
attribute that is introduced using nanotechnology. We analyze
whether trust correlates with the acceptance of a functional food
attribute (here: vitamin enrichment and protection) and if this
evaluation changes when consumers learn that the attribute has
been created by means of nanotechnology.
Food nanotechnology is regulated under existing legislation
(European Commission, 2012; Government of Canada, 2013) and
a case by case approach is applied through a pre-market approval
system (European Commission, 2012). A review of approaches to
the regulatory governance of nanotechnology up to 2009 can be
found in Pelley and Saner (2009). However, the application of
nanotechnology in the food domain is surrounded by high levels
of scientic uncertainty with several studies pointing to possible
negative long term effects (Wang et al., 2006; Oberdrster et al.,
2005). The application of nanotechnology in the food industry is
still limited and new and rather unknown to consumers. In this
context of low knowledge, high complexity and high uncertainty
nobody retains the authority of better knowledge (Luhmann,
1993) and the safety of the food market increasingly depends on
the decisions of the responsible actors (Fischler, 1988). Consumer
acceptance of such new, complex technologies is likely to depend
on how much they trust these actors.

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J. Roosen et al. / Food Policy 52 (2015) 7583

For the analysis we use data from online surveys conducted in

Canada and Germany. The German survey was accompanied by
an economic laboratory experiment. In all three studies, we propose
two types of orange juice to the respondents and measure WTP
under two different information scenarios. While data from the
online surveys have been analyzed in Matin et al. (2012) and
Vandermoere et al. (2010), results on the WTP data of the surveys
have not yet been published. Bieberstein et al. (2013) analyze the
experimental data used in this paper, however, the WTP data has
not been linked to the question of trust. To our knowledge, this presents one of the few studies that analyze the impact of trust on
WTP. Nocella et al. (2010) analyze the impact of trust on consumers
WTP for higher animal welfare standards. However, they measure
trust not as institutional trust, but by using Fishbeins attitude
model. Oh and Hong (2012) provide a theoretical analysis of the
role of trust on WTP, where trust presents a shift in the expected
value of an uncertain outcome. Meyer and Liebe (2010) use a measure of generalized trust as an antecedent of WTP for environmental
protection in Switzerland. Our analysis differs from previous analysis in that we use institutional trust as a determinant of WTP
and that we not only analyze the mean impact, but also aspects
of the distributional impact based on experimental data.
Our results show that information about the use of a new technology in the food domain leads to a welfare decrease for consumers. Furthermore, we can show that trust increases WTP and that it
protects WTP from bad news.
The paper proceeds in four sections. First, a literature review
covers the different denitions of trust and their amenability for
a meaningful denition of trust in the context of WTP studies.
The following section describes the surveys and the methods for
measuring trust and WTP. Results are presented next and the paper
concludes with implications for research and regulation.

The role of trust

Literature review
Trust is a construct that has been developed in the social sciences. In this section we attempt to grasp the signicance of trust
in the social sciences and its meaning for the economics of consumers dealing with new food technologies.
According to Earle (2000) many trust researchers accept some
version of the denition offered by Rousseau et al. (1998): Trust
is a psychological state comprising the intention to accept vulnerability based upon positive expectations of the intentions or behavior of another (p. 395). This type of interpersonal trust has been
dened in a trustortrustee relationship and more specically as
a state of expectation from a trustor (Gambetta, 1988; Bradach
and Eccles, 1989). An alternative approach to trust is less centered
on the individual and includes groups as trusting or trusted actors.
Rotter (1967, p. 651), for example, denes interpersonal trust as
expectancy held by an individual or a group that the word, promise,
verbal or written statement of another individual or group can be
relied upon. (see also Nooteboom, 1996). Another denition of
basic trust goes back to Erikson (1953) who describes it as central
to a healthy personality. Trust in terms of personality has been
assessed using attitudinal survey questions such as the one in general social surveys that asks the following: Generally speaking,
would you say that most people can be trusted or that you cant
be too careful in dealing with people? (Glaeser et al., 2000, p. 812).
Research on technology acceptance has focused on the impact
of social trust on technological risk perception and on the acceptance of a technology. Hereby, the denition of social trust relates
to interpersonal relationships and to relationships between
individuals and institutions (Kasperson et al., 1992). While inter-

personal trust and institutional trust are often differentiated

(Hudson, 2006), the latter is supposed to be important in complex
societies such as ours (Luhmann, 1968/2000) and important for
understanding the acceptance of modern technologies. Institutional trust has also been found to play an important role in
explaining perceived risk (Earle and Cvetcovich, 1995; Siegrist
et al., 2000; Slovic, 1999) and the acceptance of new food technologies (Costa-Font et al., 2008; Visschers et al., 2007).
Trust and willingness to pay (WTP)
Calculative trust plays a central role in decisions under uncertainty and is based on the expected behavior of others. While trust
is mostly measured by attitudinal questions in the social sciences,
economists tend to use choice-based metrics (McEvily et al., 2012).
One example of measuring trust is the investment game (Berg
et al., 1995). Here two groups of players interact on an investment.
A player in group A can share an amount x of his show-up fee, say
10, with a player in group B. By this investment the amount grows
to ax, where a > 1, and players in group B can decide the share to be
returned (b). For a player in group A the pay-off is 10  x + a bx,
and for the player in group B it is (1  b)ax. The full information
equilibrium of this game is to invest nothing. However, precluding
side arrangements, individuals still invest and this is based on
trust. Indeed, it is this feature of trust in overcoming the transaction costs of self-protection that makes trust ubiquitous in economic relationships (Arrow, 1974). Trust means that an
individual is willing to forego self-protecting behavior that would
come at a cost. Hence McEvily et al. (2012) turn to a denition of
distrust that is expressed in terms of the (transaction) cost that
someone is willing to bear in order to be less vulnerable to the
action of another party. Taking a positive perspective, trust avoids
costs that arise from measures of self-protection.
Translating this idea into a utility maximizing framework, our
model starts on a money gamble. Suppose the payoff of an individual is x  L with probability p and x with probability 1  p. The
expected utility of the outcome is hence:

EU pux  L 1  pux

where u is the instantaneous utility function and L is the loss in the

gamble. Now suppose the individual can invest an amount e in prevention or self-protection (Ehrlich and Becker, 1972). By this
amount the individual is capable of decreasing the probability of
a loss, so that

maxe EU peux  L  e 1  peux  e

where p decreases in e. It has been shown that the optimal amount

of prevention effort is not monotonic in risk aversion (Dionne and
Eeckhoudt, 1985) and prudence (Eeckhoudt and Gollier, 2005). In
contrast to a mean-preserving contraction of the payoff distribution
in the sense of Rothschild and Stiglitz (1970) prevention causes a
cost that shifts the probability distribution function downward by e.
Translating the expected utility maximizing framework to the
denition of trust by Rousseau et al. (1998) and using the concept
of distrust according to McEvily et al. (2012) leads to the conclusion that self-protecting effort e is lower with higher interpersonal
trust. Hence trust alters the perceived risk by changing the probabilities of negative outcomes.
We now turn to the role that trust in food production may have
when measuring WTP. The utility of a good that is consumed in x
units depends on consumption and functional product quality
denoted by q. Utility also depends on income, w, such that u(x, q,
w). For simplicity, we consider the case where the product is either
not consumed (x = 0) or consumed in a single unit (x = 1). From this
setup we can dene the WTP for a quality q1 and q2 by the following set of equations.

J. Roosen et al. / Food Policy 52 (2015) 7583

u0; 0; w u1; q1 ; w  WTP1

u0; 0; w u1; q2 ; w  WTP2

Assume that quality q1 is brought about by some traditional

technology. A new technology then allows a different specication
of the attribute as q2. However, this new technology is associated
with the risk of a loss L with probability p and yields a new WTP
dened by

u0; 0; w pu1; q2 ; w  L  WTP2 1  pu1; q2 ; w  WTP2

5
Combining (3) and (5) gives

u1; q1 ; w  WTP1 pu1; q2 ; w  L  WTP2

1  pu1; q2 ; w  WTP2

Three different cases arise:

(a) The qualities of the products produced with traditional and
new technologies are equal (q1 = q2). In this case, the new
technology, 2, introduces a risk to consumers and
WTP1 > WTP2.
(b) The new technology leads to more effective functional
benets (q1 < q1). In this case, the risk perception, p and L,
the benet perception, q2, as well as the preferences of the
consumer, u(), determine the relationship between WTP1
and WTP2. WTP2 will increase with trust as trust reduces
self-protecting effort, e.g. foregoing the functional benet
of the new technology.
(c) A trusting consumer will be more ready to accept eventual
uncertainty posed by the technology. We consider two
cases:
Good news: WTP increases with the introduction of a new technology, i.e., WTP2 > WTP1. A high level of trust will make this
increase in WTP larger and WTP2  WTP1 will increase with
trust.
Bad news: WTP decreases with the introduction of a new technology, i.e., WTP2 < WTP1. A high level of trust will make this
decrease in WTP smaller and WTP2  WTP1 will decrease in
absolute value with trust.
Methods
We study the impact of trust on WTP for a new food technology.
An online survey was conducted in Canada and Germany. The German survey was accompanied by an economic laboratory experiment. In all three studies, we present two types of hypothetical
orange juice to the respondents and measure WTP under two different information scenarios. As no food products using openly nanotechnology were available on the market at the time, we created
the nanocharacteristics based on a review of literature, selecting
the most likely nanotechnology application in the food domain.
The survey questionnaire
The questionnaire contains three parts. First, attitudinal questions are asked regarding food choice motives based on Steptoe
et al. (1995) and institutional trust. The institutional trust question
prompts respondents to indicate their trust in the respective institutions regarding their responsibility over the safety of food. Six
institutions are considered: Agriculture, food-industry, science/
research, pharmaceutical industry, government agencies/public
authorities and consumer organizations. Responses were recorded
on a 5-point rating scale from 1 = no trust to 5 = very high trust. An
exploratory factor analysis on the data of the six variables in each

77

country shows that trust in the rst ve institutions loads on the

same factor, while trust in consumer organizations loads on a second factor. Hence an overall trust variable was constructed as the
mean score for the rst ve trust items.
Additional questions were asked regarding health risks: How
do you consider the health risk posed to consumers by regular consumption of . . . and a list, as provided in Table 3, is used for a rating
scale from very low risk (1) to very high risk (5).
Questions on WTP follow. The product proles presented to the
respondents are two types of orange juice, one fortied with vitamin
D, the second in a UV-light protecting bottle that protects the vitamin C in the orange juice. Questions in the online survey were posed
in form of a one- and-one-half-bound (OOHB) dichotomous choice
question (Cooper et al., 2002). The OOHB method is thought to overcome starting point bias related to the double-bound dichotomous
choice method (Hanemann et al., 1991). At the same time, it may
preserve efciency gains over single dichotomous choice questions.
Based on a market search in local supermarkets two price levels
for a 1-liter bottle of orange juice were chosen (Ca-$ 1.75/ 0.90
and Ca-$2.50/1.80) and introduced as the variation of the typical
market price.1 Using different price levels limits the comparability of
the results for the two countries. However, it allows basing consumer responses on a naturally observed anchor. Respondents were
randomized into rst receiving the lower (upper) price. If their
answer to the rst price was positive (negative), they received a second question with the upper (lower) price. In a rst set of WTP questions people had not been informed about the use of nanotechnology
in these products. In the next step, consumers were informed about
the nature of nanotechnology and the particular use of changing the
functional attributes of the products. The WTP questions were then
repeated (see Fig. 1). Between these two WTP questions, the following information was given:

Nanotechnology refers to materials, systems and processes which exist or operate in the range of about 1
100 nm (nm). One nanometer (nm) is one millionth of a
millimeter (mm). Materials at this scale show novel properties that lead to novel applications in diverse fields such
as medicine, cosmetics, biotechnology, energy production and environmental science. There is uncertainty
regarding how nanomaterials may interact with human
health and the environment.
Nanotechnology offers new opportunities for food industry application. Manufactured nanomaterials are already
used in some food products, nutritional supplements,
and food packaging applications. Nanotechnology allows
for the improvement of barrier functions in food packaging to reduce UV-light exposure or microbial growth and
thus extend the shelf-life of many food-products. Furthermore, nano-biosensors are able to control the foods level
of freshness by indicating spoiled food to the consumers
by means of color change. There is not much known about
the effects on human health and environment.

Finally, socio-demographic variables were collected.

The experiment proceeded similarly, but WTP was measured
using a price list from 0.90 and 1.80 in 10 cents intervals for a
1 l bottle of orange juice. Participants could answer the question
1
Using an exchange rate of 1 = 1.38 Ca-$, 0.90 correspond to about Ca-$ 1.25, and
1.80 correspond to Ca-$ 2.50.

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J. Roosen et al. / Food Policy 52 (2015) 7583

Willingness to pay I
In what follows we will present you information about two pure orange juices sold in one litre
bottles. On the market, the average price of this type of orange juice varies between $1.75 and
$2.50 per litre.
Orange juice A

Orange juice B

This orange juice is fortified with vitamin D.

According to scientific estimation, many
Canadians have vitamin D intakes below
recommendations as a result of inadequate
intake and inadequate sunlight exposure.

This orange juice is filled in a plastic bottle

that is fabricated in a way to reduce the
juices exposure to UV-light. Exposure to
UV-light has an adverse effect on important
food nutrients like vitamin C.

Willingness to pay II
Nanotechnology offers new opportunities for food industry application. Manufactured
nanomaterials are already used in some food products, nutritional supplements, and food
packaging applications.
Two examples in development are the two orange juices than have already been presented to
you above. (In the market, the average price of this type of orange juice varies between $1.75
and $2.50 per litre)
Orange juice A

Orange juice B

Orange juice A is fortified with vitamin D

by means of nanotechnology. The vitamin D
is enclosed in a nanoscale capsule that
allows a better absorption and mobilization
of the vitamin. According to scientific
estimations, many Canadians have vitamin
D intakes below recommendations as a
result of inadequate intake and inadequate
sunlight exposure.

Orange juice B is produced by means of

nanotechnology. The bottle is imbued with
nano titanium dioxide particles that reduce UV
damage of food nutrients. Exposure to UVlight has an adverse effect on important food
nutrients like vitamin C.

Fig. 1. Product information within the WTP questions.

for their willingness to buy the juices at the varying prices with
yes, no or maybe. Only afrmative yes-responses were counted
in determining WTP.

Analysis of trust and risk perception

First descriptive statistics are calculated for the sample as a
whole. Then, the sample is separated into low and high institutional trust, where low trust is dened as Trust < 3. The two subsamples were compared with respect to their perceptions of food
risks.

(1) The respondent accepts the product neither at the low nor at
the high price. The probability for the observation is
pnm GPLi ; h.
(2) The respondent accepts the product at the low price but not
at the high price. The probability is pym GP Ui ; h  GPLi ; h.
(3) The respondent accepts the product at the high price. The
probability is pyy 1  GPUi ; h.
In the choice question, a maybe option was included: these
maybe responses have been counted as no answers in the
econometric estimation.
The resulting log-likelihood function for the sample i = 1, . . . , N
is

Analysis of WTP

ln Lh
For the analysis of the WTP variables in the OOHB format, we
follow Cooper et al. (2002). Let the true, unknown WTP of consumer i be denoted by Ci. Ci can be cast in the random utility framework and is a function of personal characteristics of respondent i.
I.e., if WTP follows a cumulative distribution function G(Ci, h), then
the parameter vector h describes the parameters of the distribution, such as the mean and variance.
Two different prices are proposed to respondents: PU(=$2.5/
1.80) and PL (=$1.75/0.90). There are three possibilities:

N h
X


 



nn
yn
di lnG PLi ; h di ln G PUi ; h  G PLi ; h

i1



i
yy
di ln 1  G PUi ; h
The logistic function is commonly used in dichotomous choice
estimations due to its close resemblance to the normal distribution
function and its computational ease. We use a logistic function for
G(; h) and assume that the mean is a linear function of K personal
characteristics of the respondent and the parameter vector to be
estimated. Hence, expected WTP above the price can be derived as

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J. Roosen et al. / Food Policy 52 (2015) 7583

EC i  a0 b1 X 1i . . . bK X Ki  cPi
with a0 as a constant and the parameter c to price measuring the
marginal utility of income. Average WTP for the sample average
can be estimated by estimating E[Ci] = a0  cPi (without explanatory variables), so that WTP = a0/c. The standard error of the WTP
estimate is obtained by the delta method.
Regarding the experimental WTP data, we adopt a standard
Tobit model on the pooled observations. WTPi is used as the dependent variable as censored at PU = 1.80 and PL = 0.90, so that

8
if 0:90 6 C i 6 1:80
>
< Ci
WTPi 0:90 if C i < 0:90
>
:
1:80 if C i P 1:80

Table 2
Descriptive statistics Germany online survey and lab experiment.
Variable

Websurvey (N = 750)
Mean

Male
Income
Age

0.51
1995.43
45.38

Food choice motive

M_price
M_nutrition
M_natural
Trust
Low trust

4.12
3.74
3.72
2.87
0.48

Experiment (N = 143)

Std. dev.

Mean

Std. dev.

1265.59
15.36

0.45
2 577.77
45.74

1 630.76
14.35

0.86
0.85
1.04
0.63

3.80
3.99
3.92
2.90
0.48

0.78
1.01
0.73
0.62

respondents. Compared to the population of the city the experimental sample is somewhat older and has a higher income.

Results
An online survey was conducted with 615 English speakers
residing in Canada. Table 1 provides descriptive statistics on several sociodemographics of the sample and general trust measures.
About 50% of the sample are male, the average income is Ca$70 578 and the mean age of the sample is 50.1 years. Compared
to the Canadian population survey respondents are somewhat
older and better off (Matin et al., 2012).
Among the food choice motives according to Steptoe et al.
(1995) we consider importance of price (M_price), importance
of nutrient content (M_nutrition) and importance of naturalness (M_natural) as relevant. Items are evaluated on a ve-point
Likert scale. We report summated scores with M_price containing
two, M_nutrition six, and M_natural three items. The nutrient and
the naturalness motive are with average values of 3.45 and 3.39 of
about equal importance. The price motive is slightly more important (3.69). The average institutional trust in food has a mean value
of 2.75 (on a 5-point scale) and 55% of the sample show low trust
(point value below three).
The German online survey was conducted with a sample of 750
respondents between February and April 2009. Table 2 provides
descriptive statistics. The average age is 45 years, 51% of the sample are male. Net monthly income is on average 1 995. Compared
to the German population survey respondents are less well-off
(Federal Statistical Ofce of Germany, 2013). The price motive
turns to be most important (4.12) compared to nutrition (3.74)
and naturalness (3.72). The mean trust score is 2.87, yielding a
low level of trust for 48% of the sample.
Table 2 also provides some summary statistics for the experiment conducted in Munich, Germany. The lab sessions took place
between January and February 2009 with 143 participants. The
majority of participants (55%) are female and the average monthly
net income is above that of the online survey sample. The
experimental participants are of similar age as the online survey

The importance of trust for perceiving being protected against food

risks
Splitting the sample using the variable low institutional trust,
we analyze the responses to the question How do you consider
the health risk posed to consumers by regular consumption of . . . in
Table 3. Overall we observe that trust is relevant to explain concerns about food safety risks posed by various technologies. For
both countries and all risks low trust consumers are more concerned about food safety risks posed by food technologies, hence
conrming the institutional trust hypothesis. The two subsamples
show signicant differences in concern for the foods grown with
pesticides and other chemicals, GMOs, irradiated food, preservatives and articial coloring, meat/sh containing hormones and
antibiotics and foods based on nanotechnology in Canada. In Germany, differences are additionally signicant for supplements
and enriched foods.
WTP for functional attribute before and after information on
nanotechnology
Using the responses of the OOHB dichotomous choice questions
in the Canadian survey and the relevant individual characteristics
of the respondents, we obtain 510 valid responses. The parameter
estimates of the likelihood maximization are given in Table 4.
The hypothetical product juice A is vitamin D enriched. First,
respondents do not know details of how the benet was achieved
(second column of Table 4). Institutional trust inuences WTP positively. Men and women do not differ in their evaluation. Higher
importance of price in the consumption decisions decreases WTP
while more importance attributed to nutrient value increases
WTP. Education and other sociodemographic variables had also

Table 1
Descriptive statistics Canada online survey.
Variablea

Denition

Mean

Std. Dev.

Male (N = 613)
Income (N = 610)
Age (N = 615)

1 = Male, 0 = Female
Total household income in Ca-$ (annual)
In years

0.49
70577.87
50.10

33937.12
13.79

Summated scale on importance of price

Summated scale on importance of nutrient content
Summated scale on importance of naturalness
How much trust do you have in the following institutions regarding their responsibility over the safety of food?
Mean value for agriculture, food industry, science/research, pharmaceutical industries, gov. agencies/public
authorities (scores range from 1 = no trust to 5 = very high trust)
Dummy variable = 1 if Trust < 3

3.69
3.45
3.39
2.75

0.91
0.85
1.11
0.76

Food choice motive

M_price (N = 606)
M_nutrition (N = 594)
M_natural (N = 596)
Trust (N = 540)

Low trust (N = 540)

a

Because of varying number of missing data, the number of observation is indicated in parentheses (N=).

0.55

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J. Roosen et al. / Food Policy 52 (2015) 7583

Table 3
Risk perception in Canada and Germany, online survey.
Canada

Vitamin and mineral food supplements

Foods enriched with vitamins or minerals
Foods grown or treated with pesticides and other
chemicals
GMOs
Irradiated food
Preservatives and articial coloring
Meat/sh containing hormones and antibiotics
Foods that are based on nanotechnology
*
**
***

Germany

Total
Mean(Std.
Dev.)

Low Trust
Mean(Std.
Dev.)

High Trust
Mean(Std.
Dev.)

Total
Mean(Std.
Dev.)

Low Trust
Mean(Std.
Dev.)

High Trust
Mean(Std.
Dev.)

2.21(0.84)
2.17(0.84)
3.84(1.02)

2.25(0.84)
2.18(0.83)
3.99(1.00)

2.14(0.84)
2.14(0.85)
3.65(1.02)***

2.73(1.04)
2.53(0.97)
4.41(0.92)

2.86(1.08)
2.63(1.02)
4.50(0.93)

2.61(0.98)***
2.44(0.91)**
4.33(0.91)***

3.53(1.15)
3.52(1.15)
3.54(1.00)
3.83(0.99)
3.13(1.13)

3.74(1.11)
3.63(1.11)
3.79(0.96)
4.04(0.92)
3.44(1.12)

3.27(1.15)***
3.37(1.17)**
3.23(0.98)***
3.57(1.02)***
2.82(1.05)***

3.95(1.12)
4.29(0.97)
3.62(0.97)
4.44(0.88)
3.66(1.13)

4.03(1.16)
4.35(0.99)
3.75(1.04)
4.56(0.83)
3.82(1.13)

3.87(1.08)***
4.24(0.95)**
3.49(0.95)***
4.34(0.90)***
3.49(1.11)***

Refer to the difference between high and low samples being signicant at the 10% level as tested by a MannWhitney U-test per country.
Refer to the difference between high and low samples being signicant at the 5% level as tested by a MannWhitney U-test per country.
Refer to the difference between high and low samples being signicant at the 1% level as tested by a MannWhitney U-test per country.

Table 4
Parameters of logistic one-and-a half bound estimation, Canada (N = 510).
Juice A (Vitamin D enriched)

Juice B (Vitamin C protected)

Without Nano

With Nano

Without Nano

With Nano

Constant
Trust
Gender (male = 1)
M_price
M_nutr
M_nat
Price

2.747*** (0.586)
0.331*** (0.116)
0.068 (0.168)
0.253** (0.106)
0.500*** (0.140)
0.030 (0.107)
2.265*** (0.149)

1.010 (0.580)
0.387*** (0.115)
0.124 (0.173)
0.020 (0.111)
0.326** (0.145)
0.107 (0.113)
1.706*** (0.136)

1.777*** (0.578)
0.313*** (0.116)
0.198 (0.169)
0.081 (0.105)
0.342** (0.141)
0.032 (0.106)
1.996*** (0.147)

0.443 (0.614)
0.364*** (0.128)
0.339* (0.187)
0.028 (0.121)
0.245 (0.155)
0.169 (0.122)
1.512*** (0.145)

LogL

527.337

502.689

514.423

442.404

Standard errors are in parentheses.

*
Refer to signicance at the 0.10 level.
**
Refer to signicance at the 0.05 level.
***
Refer to signicance at the 0.01 level.

been included; because all of them turned out to be insignicant,

the more parsimonious specication is presented here. Finally
the price coefcient is highly signicant and indicates that utility
decreases with increasing price.
When respondents are informed about the use of nanotechnology for increasing the bioavailability of vitamin D (third column of
Table 4), the constant reduces and becomes insignicant. The only
signicant explanatory variables are now the food choice motive
nutrient content, institutional trust and price.
For juice B, packaged in a bottle protecting content from UVlight to secure vitamin C content, we see that WTP before the information about nanotechnology is dependent on the food choice
motive nutrient content, trust and price (fourth column). After
information about nanotechnology (fth column), heterogeneity
between the sexes increases and men respond more positively to
the information as compared to women. The nutrient content
motive turns out to be less important and insignicant. Again trust
has a positive inuence on WTP. Finally price remains an important explanatory variable.
Using related estimates without explanatory variables allows
for the estimation of WTP, as reported in Table 5. Mean WTP is
higher for juice A with $1.900 before information about nanotechnology and $1.655 after the information about nanotechnology, as
compared to juice B, where the WTP is $1.754 and $1.326, respectively. In both cases, information about the use of nanotechnology
is deemed bad news.
It can be noted that the original benet perceived for product A
is higher. This may be related to the information given about product A (ghting ubiquitous vitamin D deciency in Canada), while

Table 5
Mean WTP and condence intervals, Canada (N = 510).

WTP without
Nano
WTP with Nano

Juice A (Vitamin D
enriched)

Juice B (Vitamin C
protected)

1.900*** (1.824; 1.975)

1.754*** (1.665; 1.843)

1.655*** (1.545; 1.765)

1.326*** (1.167; 1.486)

Condence intervals are in parentheses.

***
Refers to signicance at the 0.01.

product B may be perceived as less benecial given the easily alternative sources of vitamin C. This coincides with results by Zhou
(2013) that show a lower WTP for nanopackaging in a hypothetical
choice experiment conducted on US consumers compared to a
functional health benet offered by nanodrops. The lower preference for nanopackaging may also explain why WTP for juice B
decreases by a larger amount as compared to juice A when respondents learn that the juice is produced by means of nanotechnology.
Indeed, the decrease in mean WTP is much larger for juice B
($0.428) than juice A ($0.245).
Tables 6 and 7 show the results for the German online survey.
The sample size reduces to 740 respondents due to missing data.
Results are fairly similar compared with Canada. Male compared
to female respondents have a higher WTP (not signicant for Juice
A before Nano information). Price is a food choice motive that
reduces WTP for Juice B without Nano information whereas the
motive nutrition (M_nutr) increases it for Juice A. Finally trust

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J. Roosen et al. / Food Policy 52 (2015) 7583

Table 6
Parameters of logistic one-and-a half bound estimation, Germany (N = 740).
Juice A (Vitamin D enriched)

Juice B (Vitamin C protected)

Without Nano

with Nano

Without Nano

With Nano

Constant
Trust
Gender (male = 1)
M_price
M_nutr
M_nat
Price

0.406 (0.536)
0.418*** (0.118)
0.182 (0.147)
0.056 (0.094)
0.204* (0.121)
0.010 (0.098)
2.583*** (0.150)

0.836 (0.638)
0.709*** (0.131)
0.603*** (0.171)
0.084 (0.107)
0.138 (0.138)
0.147 (0.108)
2.315*** (0.179)

1.334** (0.567)
0.363*** (0.122)
0.369** (0.152)
0.232** (0.099)
0.033 (0.121)
0.152 (0.099)
2.791*** (0.189)

0.287 (0.579)
0.672*** (0.127)
0.579*** (0.163)
0.156 (0.104)
0.127 (0.132)
0.118 (0.103)
2.276*** (0.161)

LogL

663.173

525.655

596.815

576.064

Standard errors are in parentheses.

*
Refer to signicance at the 0.10 level.
**
Refer to signicance at the 0.05 level.
***
Refer to signicance at the 0.01 level.

Table 7
Mean WTP and condence intervals Germany (N = 740).

WTP without
Nano
WTP with Nano

Juice A (Vitamin D
enriched)

Juice B (Vitamin C
protected)

0.851*** (0.793; 0.909)

0.738*** (0.677; 0.799)

0.502*** (0.403; 0.601)

0.597*** (0.510; 0.684)

Condence intervals are in parentheses.

***
Refers to signicance at the 0.01.

has a signicant and positive impact in all four estimations. In

comparison to Canada it is interesting to note that the parameter
almost doubles from before to after information about the use of
nanotechnology. For example, the parameter for the trust variable
for Juice A (Juice B) changes from 0.331 (0.313) in the case without
information about the use of nanotechnology to 0.387 (0.364) in
the case with information for Canada, while it changes from
0.418 (0.363) to 0.709 (0.672) for Germany. This means that in
the German sample trust is much more important for the acceptance of nanotechnology. Table 7 shows the mean WTP estimates
for Germany. Estimated condence intervals are lower in comparison to Canada. However, as different prices were used in the WTP
elicitation, a direct comparison is not possible. Comparing the WTP
for the products, Juice A receives a higher WTP initially. However,
after information about the use of nanotechnology WTP for Juice B
is larger than WTP for Juice A. This contrasts to results for Canada
and for results of a US study (Zhou, 2013).
Distribution of WTP for functional attribute before and after
information on nanotechnology based on lab experiments
To gain further insights into the interplay of trust with shifts in
WTP, we analyze data collected in a laboratory experiment.

Because WTP has been elicited using a price list, empirical distributions of WTP can be described. The WTP data is described in
Table 8. Average WTP is 1.154 for Juice A and 1.004 for Juice B
(including zero bids). WTP decreases with information about the
use of nanotechnology. Hence also in the experiment, the use of
the technology is evaluated as bad news. Juice B is rejected by
more consumers, however, the number of consumers decreasing
their bid to zero is not as large (9) as in the case of Juice A (41).
Splitting the sample into consumers with low and high trust, it
can be observed that the low trust consumers are more likely to
decrease their bid to zero when they learn about the application
of nanotechnology, even if only slightly. E.g. for juice A the number
of nonengaged consumers increases from 11 to 33 in the sample of
low trust respondents and from 7 to 26 in the sample of high trust
respondents.
Fig. 2 shows the empirical cumulative distribution functions
(cdf) of WTP before and after information about the use of nanotechnology for juice A and B. Values below the lower bound of
the price list at 0.90 are coded as a WTP of zero, whereas yesresponses to a price of 1.80 are recorded as 1.80. To explain
the gure, we carefully discuss the graph for Juice A and the low
trust sample (upper left). As shown by the red, solid line, about
12.5% of the sample has a WTP below 0.90. As the WTP value
increases, the share of respondents with a WTP of a given value
and below increases stepwise, as we asked for WTP in 10 cents
intervals. The blue, dotted line shows the cdf after the information
that Juice A was manufactured by means of nanotechnology. The
upward and left shift of the step functions indicates the increase
in the proportion of respondents denoting a zero WTP (now 50%
of the sample). Indeed the maximum WTP observed is 1.60, while
it was 1.80 before the information.
In all cases the WTP distribution shifts leftwards after information about the use of nanotechnology. Comparing the low trust and

Table 8
Description of WTP data, experiment, Germany.
Juice A (Vitamin D enriched)

Juice B (Vitamin C protected)

Without Nano

With Nano

Without Nano

With Nano

Average WTP
incl. zero bidsa
excl. zero bids

1.154
1.298

0.756
1.280

1.004
1.290

0.878
1.283

Number of Zero/Non-zero bids

Full sample
Low trust
High trust

18/119
11/54
7/65

59/80
33/32
26/48

36/101
22/42
14/59

45/93
26/38
19/55

Bids with no responses at all prices have been coded as 0.00. Bids with yes responses at all prices are coded as 1.80.

82

J. Roosen et al. / Food Policy 52 (2015) 7583

Juice A - Low Trust (N=64)

Juice A - High Trust (N=75)

1
0.9
0.8
0.7
0.6
CDF 0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0

0.8
0.6

CDF
0.4
0.2
0

0.5

1.5

WTP

Aer Informaon A

before Informaon A

Aer Informaon A

Juice B - Low Trust (N=63)

1.5
Before Informaon A

0.8

0.6

0.6

CDF

0.4
0.2
0

WTP

Juice B - High Trust (N=75)

0.8

CDF

0.5

0.4
0.2

0.5

1.5

WTP

Aer Informaon B

before Informaon B

Aer Informaon B

0.5

WTP

1.5
Before Informaon B

Fig. 2. Cumulative distribution of WTP for juices measured in experiment, Germany.

high trust samples for juice A and juice B, it becomes obvious that
before information (solid lines) the distribution of WTP for the high
trust sample is to the right of the one for the low trust sample. In
all four graphs it is consistently observed that the information
about the use of nanotechnology leads to a leftward shift in the
cumulative distribution function. Based on this descriptive result
it appears that the distribution of WTP after information is
rst-degree stochastically dominated by that from before the information. This means that information about the use of a new technology leads to a welfare decrease for consumers. As before, the
information is considered bad news. Secondly, we observe that
high levels of trust not only increased (rightward shift) the initial
WTP distribution of respondents but also reduced the size of the
leftward shift in the distribution due to new information. Hence,
trust seems to yield a double dividend, in the form of a higher original acceptance of nanotechnology and less reduction after additional information is provided about the technology.

We analyze the experimental data further by estimating a tobit

model of the WTP distribution. Table 9 shows the results. Here
observations before and after the information about the use of
nanotechnology are pooled together and the variable Information
indicates a dummy variable that equals unity after the information
treatment. The results in Table 9 show that the information lowers
WTP in both cases (Juice A and B) but only signicantly so for Juice
A. This is similar to a study in Switzerland by Siegrist et al. (2007)
where food packaging applications of nanotechnology were perceived more favorably compared to nanotechnology food applications. Trust has a positive and signicant impact in both cases.
Again the food choice motives price and naturalness lowers
WTP (though not always signicantly). The food choice motive
nutrient content has a mixed impact on consumers WTP.

Table 9
Parameters of Tobit estimation, experiment, Germany.

The results of this paper show that the use of nanotechnology

raises concerns in consumers minds about either juice or packaging of juice produced with nanotechnology. It is unclear at this
point whether these concerns are related to lack of awareness of
nanotechnology in the general public or lack of awareness of nanotechnology uses in the food industry. Decima Research (2006)
reported generally favorable attitudes toward the use of nanotechnology, in general, in the Canadian society with approximately 47%
of the population, at that time, having some familiarity with nanotechnology. Similarly, the Federal Institute of Risk Assessment
reported based on a survey in 2008 that 50% of Germans have some
familiarity with nanotechnology, but that the level of acceptance
for packaging technologies is higher as compared to fortication
technologies (Zimmer et al., 2008).
As shown in our results, trust can often ameliorate risk perceptions in the presence of scientic uncertainty about a technology or
products. In our case trust was shown to reduce the levels of concern and to restore condence in the market. As suggested in the

Juice A (Vitamin D
enriched)
N = 268

Juice B (Vitamin C
protected)
N = 267

Constant
Information
Trust
Gender
(male = 1)
M_price
M_nutr
M_nat
Sigma

1.231*** (0.199)
0.206*** (0.042)
0.069** (0.033)
0.020 (0.043)

1.601*** (0.216)
0.050 (0.045)
0.061* (0.037)
0.028 (0.046)

0.039 (0.030)
0.070** (0.033)
0.085*** (0.026)
0.322*** (0.018)

0.112*** (0.032)
0.025 (0.037)
0.030 (0.028)
0.350*** (0.021)

LogL

132.934

152.556

Standard errors are in parentheses.

*
Refer to signicance at the 0.10 level.
**
Refer to signicance at the 0.05 level.
***
Refer to signicance at the 0.01 level.

Conclusion

J. Roosen et al. / Food Policy 52 (2015) 7583

sociological and economic literature, trust reduces the vulnerability

that consumers feel and therefore lowers the level of self-protection measures such as foregoing the benets of a new technology.
As for our conjectures stated at the end of the section The role
of trust we can conclude that the information about the use of
nanotechnology is considered bad news. This is a consistent
result for Canada and Germany in the online surveys and in the
experiment for Germany. It has also been found for the US by
Zhou (2013) and for Switzerland by Siegrist et al. (2007).
Concerning regulatory discussions around mandatory labeling
of products containing nanomaterials, this nano labeling means
bad news for many consumers and marketing of nanotechnology
innovations are limited to those who trust the involved actors.
Against the background of limited scientic certainty, however,
those consumers who are rather skeptical serve as watchdogs of
the food system (Berg, 2004) and should therefore be actively
involved in the regulatory process by measures of citizen participation. The importance of trust is also an expression of an increasing
complexity in the food market, making individual consumers
increasingly dependent on the decisions of those bodies responsible bodies for regulation and oversight of the food sector.
Acknowledgment
The authors thank Alberta Agriculture and Rural Development,
the German Research Foundation (DFG) and the French Research
Agency (ANR) for funding.
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