Influence of evoked contexts on rating-based conjoint analysis: Case study with lamb meat Juliana Cunha de Andrade a,⇑ , Élen Silveira Nalério b , Citieli Giongo b , Marcia Dutra de Barcellos c , Gastón Ares d , Rosires Deliza e a Institute of Chemistry, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Avenida Athos da Silveira Ramos, 149 – bloco A, CEP 21.941-909, Cidade Universitária, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil b Embrapa Pecuária Sul, P.O. Box 242, BR 153 km 603, CEP 96.401-970 Bagé, RS, Brazil c Post-Graduation Programme in Management (UFRGS/PPGA), Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, Rua Washington Luiz, 855, 3° andar, CEP 90010-460 Porto Alegre, RS, Brazil d Sensometrics & Consumer Science, Instituto Polo Tecnológico de Pando, Facultad de Química, Universidad de la República, By Pass de Rutas 8 y 101 s/n, Pando, Canelones, Uruguay e Embrapa Agroindústria de Alimentos, Avenida das Américas, 29501, CEP 23.020-470 Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil article info Article history: Received 28 February 2016 Received in revised form 23 June 2016 Accepted 27 June 2016 Available online 28 June 2016 Keywords: Conjoint analysis Packaging Lamb meat Context Consumer research abstract The aim of the present work was to evaluate the influence of two evoked consumption contexts on con- sumers’ intention to purchase lamb meat cuts using rating-based conjoint analysis. Participants were randomly assigned to one of the evoked consumption contexts: a celebratory lunch with family over the weekend (n = 157), and a dinner at home after a day’s work (n = 171). Rating-based conjoint analysis was used to evaluate the influence of four independent variables on consumers’ intention to purchase lamb meat in each of the two evoked consumption contexts: type of cut, presentation, seasoning and price. Intention to purchase scores were significantly affected by the evoked context. Consumers were more willing to purchase lamb meat when the celebratory weekend lunch context was considered, com- pared to the weekday dinner. In the two contexts, price was the most important variable affecting will- ingness to purchase lamb meat, followed by type of cut. However, at the aggregate level the utility values were similar for the two contexts: consumers expressed higher intention to purchase for leg cuts without seasoning at the highest price. In the two contexts different consumer segments were identified, which gave different relative importance to the variables included in the conjoint task. However, conclusions regarding consumers’ segmentation were affected by evoked consumption context. The findings suggest that evoked consumption contexts influence results from conjoint analysis, which suggests that they may be an interesting methodological alternative to increase the validity of conjoint tasks. Ó 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Food choice is a complex process that depends on several inter- related variables, which can be grouped into characteristics of the person who makes the choice, characteristics of the product itself, and characteristics of the specific context in which the choice is made (Köster, 2009). Context, defined as the specific situational and temporal conditions in which a specific food choice is made, has been shown to have a large influence on consumer perception (Meiselman, 2006). However, the majority of consumer studies are carried out without considering context, which can decrease con- sumers’ involvement with the task and lead to inaccurate responses (Köster, 2003). Therefore, the consideration of context seems necessary to increase the validity and predictive ability of consumer studies (Korzen & Lassen, 2010). Awareness of the need to consider consumption context when measuring consumer responses to food has prompted the need to seek methodological developments that provide a better balance between research carried out under controlled laboratory condi- tions and natural settings (Meiselman, 2013). One of the simplest ways to consider context during the evaluation of food products under laboratory settings is the use of written scenarios to evoke consumption contexts (Hein, Hamid, Jaeger, & Delahunty, 2010). These scenarios instruct participants to image a situation and to think of that specific situation when evaluating products. The use evoked context has been reported to influence con- sumers’ overall liking scores and increase sample discrimination (Hein, Hamid, Jaeger, & Delahunty, 2012; Hein et al., 2010; http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.foodqual.2016.06.013 0950-3293/Ó 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. ⇑ Corresponding author. E-mail address: jucunhadeandrade@gmail.com (J.C. de Andrade). Food Quality and Preference 53 (2016) 168–175 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Food Quality and Preference journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/foodqual