MEASURING CHILDREN’S FOOD PREFERENCES: USING PICTURES IN A COMPUTERIZED CONJOINT ANALYSIS A. OLSEN 1,4 , H. KILDEGAARD 2 , G. GABRIELSEN 3 , A.K. THYBO 2 and P. MØLLER 1 1 Department of Food Science, Faculty of Life Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Rolighedsvej 30, 1958 Frederiksberg C, Denmark 2 Department of Food Science, Faculty of Agricultural Sciences, Aarhus University, Årslev, Denmark 3 Centre for Statistics, Department of Finance, Copenhagen Business School, Frederiksberg, Denmark 4 Corresponding author. TEL: +45 35 33 32 53; FAX: +45 35 33 35 09; EMAIL: ano@life.ku.dk Accepted for Publication June 2, 2012 doi:10.1111/j.1745-459X.2012.00391.x ABSTRACT The aim of this study is to investigate if children’s food preferences can be reliable measured by using pictures of foods presented on a computer screen in a conjoint layout. We investigate reproducibility (test–retest) and infer validity by comparison with traditional hedonic evaluations of tangible products and a choice test. In total, 300 children from schools in Copenhagen participated in the study. Two product cases were included: 32 buns and 8 juices. Pictures of the products were presented and evaluated on a computer screen using a conjoint layout. Right after the test, four buns and two juices (tangible products), chosen to span the preference spectrum, were hedonically evaluated for appearance and taste. Finally, an actual product choice was performed by having the children choose between two buns and two juices. Results showed that the computer evaluations with pictures of foods provided reproducible information about the children’s visual food preferences, which were in concordance with both hedonic measures and products choices, and can thus be considered valid. PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS The paper describes a new combination of methods for measuring food preferences in children using pictures of foods manipulated on visually apparent product attributes in a computerized conjoint layout. Results were reproducible, and prod- ucts choices performed in the picture-based computer program were in concor- dance with hedonic evaluations of appearance and taste, as well as actual product choices of tangible products. Thus, using pictures in a computerized conjoint analy- sis facilitates fast and reliable measurement of food preferences in children and enables direct evaluation of the impact of individual product attributes. The method is easy and inexpensive to use, requires little time and effort from participants, is suit- able for online testing and can quickly be applied to high numbers of participants. INTRODUCTION Children are customers on one of the largest markets in many parts of the world (Popper and Kroll 2005), and they are more involved in choosing what to buy, use and eat today than they have ever been before (Chambers 2005). Therefore, it is important to understand what drives children’s food choices. Taste preferences are particularly important as they are the primary predictors of children’s food selection and con- sumption (Birch 1999). Children’s preferences can be measured in many ways (Guinard 2000). Obviously, tasting a food can reveal liking of that specific product in either qualitative or quanti- tative measures. However, this procedure is tedious, expen- sive, impractical in large scale and has the pronounced disadvantage that children can only taste a limited amount of foods before getting satiated, which might affect their evaluations. An alternative method is the use of pictures. This method focuses on visual appearance, and appearance is often the first Journal of Sensory Studies ISSN 0887-8250 1 Journal of Sensory Studies •• (2012) ••–•• © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.