Appetite 52 (2009) 199208

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Appetite
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/appet

Research report

Food Choice Questionnaire (FCQ) revisited. Suggestions for the development

of an enhanced general food motivation model
Christos Fotopoulos a, Athanasios Krystallis b, Marco Vassallo c, Anastasios Pagiaslis a,*
a

Department of Food and Agri-Business Management, University of Ioannina (UoI), George Seferi 2, GR-30100, Agrinio, Greece
MAPP, Department of Marketing and Statistics, Aarhus School of Business (ASB), University of Aarhus, Haslegaardsvej 10, DK-8210 Aarhus V, Denmark
c
Istituto Nazionale di Ricerca per gli Alimenti e la Nutrizione (INRAN), via Ardeatina 546, IT-00178, Roma, Italy
b

A R T I C L E I N F O

A B S T R A C T

Article history:
Received 14 May 2008
Received in revised form 17 September 2008
Accepted 20 September 2008

Recognising the need for a more statistically robust instrument to investigate general food selection
determinants, the research validates and conrms Food Choice Questionnaire (FCQs) factorial design,
develops ad hoc a more robust FCQ version and tests its ability to discriminate between consumer
segments in terms of the importance they assign to the FCQ motivational factors. The original FCQ
appears to represent a comprehensive and reliable research instrument. However, the empirical data do
not support the robustness of its 9-factorial design. On the other hand, segmentation results at the
subpopulation level based on the enhanced FCQ version bring about an optimistic message for the FCQs
ability to predict food selection behaviour. The paper concludes that some of the basic components of the
original FCQ can be used as a basis for a new general food motivation typology. The development of such a
new instrument, with fewer, of higher abstraction FCQ-based dimensions and fewer items per dimension,
is a right step forward; yet such a step should be theory-driven, while a rigorous statistical testing across
and within population would be necessary.
2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords:
New food motivation typology
Conrmatory factor analysis
Cluster analysis

Introduction
Food product choice is a complex function of preferences for
sensory characteristics, combined with the inuence of nonsensory factors, including food-related expectations and attitudes, health claims, price, ethical concerns and mood (Prescott,
Young, ONeil, Yau, & Stevens, 2002). A variety of social, cultural
and economic factors thus contribute to the development,
maintenance and change of dietary patterns. Intra-individual
determinants, such as physiological and psychological factors,
acquired food preferences, and knowledge can be distinguished
from interpersonal or social factors, such as family and group
inuences (Eertmans, Baeyens, & Van den Bergh, 2001).
Comprehensive models have been developed to sketch out the
way people construct the process of choosing foods in general. For
example, Frust, Connors, Bisogni, Sobal, and Winter Falk (1996)
group the factors involved in food choice into three major
components (life course, inuences and personal systems), the
particular relationship of these components to one another
generating the process or pathway leading to the point of choice.

* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: taspay@gmail.com (A. Pagiaslis).
0195-6663/$ see front matter 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.appet.2008.09.014

Although such models document the full complexity of (food)

choice,1 their comprehensive nature makes it difcult to make
predictions about actual, general food choice behaviour (Eertmans
et al., 2001).
An instrument that past research points out as one that might
have a potential to full the aim of predicting general food
choice based on its determinants is the Food Choice Questionnaire
(FCQ) (Pollard, Steptoe, & Wardle, 1998; Steptoe, Polland, & Wardle,
1995; Steptoe & Wardle, 1999). Since its introduction, FCQ is
adopted as a whole or partially at both the cross-national level (e.g.
Eertmans et al., 2006; Prescott et al., 2002), as well as a country level,
addressing general food selection determinants-related research
around the globe (see, for instance, the work by Martins and
Pliner (1998) in Canada; Glanz, Basil, Maibach, Goldberg, and Snyder
(1998) in the US; Lindeman and Vaananen (2000) in Finland;
Biloukha and Utermohlen (2000) in Ukraine; Lockie, Lyons,
Lawrence, and Mummery (2002) in Australia; Ares and Gambaro
(2007) in Uruguay; and Chryssohoidis, Krystallis, and Perreas (2007)
in Greece).

1
For a comprehensive review of the concept of human motivation, as well as its
application on the food-related research see Pincus (2004) and Eertmans, Victoir,
Notelaers, Vansant, and Van den Bergh (2006).

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C. Fotopoulos et al. / Appetite 52 (2009) 199208

Despite its above-presented applications, however, the FCQ is not

yet surrounded by the preferable amount of academic trust in its
ability to determine food-related choices satisfactorily (Eertmans
et al., 2006; Lindeman & Vaananen, 2000), due to its conceptual
deciencies that reect on its limited statistical robustness. On the
other hand, research on the relative contribution of the various
determinants to human eating behaviour appears to be scarce
(Eertmans et al., 2001). The food motivational literature seems
surprisingly void of an improved typology (although there have been
some very recent but useful attempts i.e. Byrd-Bredbenner & Abbot,
2008), which seen from a multidisciplinary point of view would
determine food selection motives comprehensively and exhaustively and which would simultaneously constitute a robust multidimensional instrument to measure food selection determinants
both across and within populations.
Recognising the need for a more statistically robust multidimensional instrument to investigate general food selection
determinants despite the existence of a substantial number of
models that attempt to predict specic food type-related behaviour
in various well-dened decision making contexts, the present
research explores the ability of the FCQ to perform that task by
focusing on its apparent statistical deciency.
FCQ description, applications and criticism
The FCQ contains 36 items representing search, experience and
credence characteristics related to intrinsic and extrinsic food
attributes that motivate consumers to make general food choices.
Respondents are instructed to rate the importance of each FCQitem for their food choices on a typical day on a unipolar 4-point
scale (1 = not at all important, 2 = little important, 3 = moderately important, and 4 = very important). The FCQ involves
nine motivational dimensions (factors), each containing three to
six items: 1. health, 2. mood, 3. convenience, 4. sensory
appeal, 5. natural content, 6. price, 7. weight control, 8.
familiarity, and 9. ethical concern. In their UK samples, Steptoe
et al. (1995) report that sensory appeal, health, convenience and
price are rated as the most important among the food choice
motives. They also report differences in food choice motives
associated with gender, age and income, and found the FCQ factors
to converge with measures of dietary restraint, eating style, the
value of health, health locus of control, and personality factors.
Steptoe et al. (1995) conclude that: . . .within western urban
populations, the FCQ provides the opportunity to assess a broad range
of factors perceived as relevant to food selection. . . (Steptoe et al.,
1995, p. 282).
More recently, the complete FCQ has been used in food-related
research in non-English speaking populations. For instance,
Lindeman and Vaananen (2000) assessed through the FCQ the
ethical food choice motives of Finish respondents; Chryssohoidis
et al. (2007) used three adapted (shorter) FCQ versions to explore
Greek consumers perceptions about the quality of specic food
products of Greek origin as opposed to the perceived quality of
their foreign-made counterparts; and Ares and Gambaro (2007)
assessed through the FCQ the inuence of Uruguayan consumers
motives underlying food choice on perceived healthiness and
willingness to try functional foods. Moreover, cross-national FCQbased comparisons in food choice motives have also been made by
Prescott et al. (2002) among consumers from Japan, Taiwan,
Malaysia and New Zealand; and by Eertmans et al. (2006) among
consumers from Italy, Belgium and Canada.
The work by Eertmans et al. (2006) aims to examine the degree
to which the 9-factorial structure of the FCQ is invariant across
western urban populations, as postulated by Steptoe et al. (1995)
in their normative work. Data were obtained from Italian, Belgian

and Canadian students. The factor solutions of those samples

appeared to differ from the conguration obtained by Steptoe et al.
(1995). Some divergences were rather small, whereas other
incongruities were large enough to reinterpret factors. Overall,
the results of the tests conducted by Eertmans et al. (2006) do not
support Steptoe et al.s (1995) assumption that the FCQ has a
factorial structure that would generalize from the original UK
samples across western urban populations (i.e. a factorial structure
that would show at least congural invariance, Steenkamp &
Baumgartener, 1998). Instead, the work by Eertmans et al. (2006)
suggests that the FCQ-items and the underlying constructs may
have different connotations in other western cultures, whether it
concerns English speaking or non-English speaking countries.
Moreover, recent research with a sample of Greek consumers
(Krystallis & Chryssohoidis, 2006) also failed to conrm the initial
FCQ factorial design.
Research aims
As mentioned previously, the present research recognises the
need for a more statistically robust multidimensional instrument
to investigate general food selection determinants, and the fact
that, to date, there appears to be a scarcity of such general food
selection motivation models in the relevant literature. Using as a
point of departure past research that adopts a rather critical stance
towards the conceptual completeness and corresponding statistical robustness of the FCQ (i.e. Chryssohoidis et al., 2007;
Eertmans et al., 2006; Lindeman & Vaananen, 2000), the present
research aims to explore the ability of the FCQ to determine food
selection motives by adopting the full 36-item FCQ measured on
bipolar 7-point Likert-type scales, validating and conrming its 9factorial design and ad hoc developing a more statistically robust
FCQ version, which will still be embodied into the original FCQ
conceptual framework. This latter aim is unique to the present
research, since no previous effort has been made in the literature to
come up with a more robust FCQ version although some efforts
have been made to develop food motivation typologies based on
the initial FCQ version at the general food selection context (e.g.
Martins & Pliner, 1998), or at a food type-specic context (e.g.
Lockie et al., 2002, for organic food and Ares & Gambaro, 2007, for
functional food).
The present research further aims to explore the relative ability
of the enhanced FCQ to discriminate among consumer segments
with clear-cut socio-demographic prole in terms of the importance consumers in each cluster assign to different food selection
motives. This type of analysis makes a great contribution to the
food-related consumer motivation literature, since little empirical work has examined the functioning of the FCQ in various
subpopulations. That is, research to date has examined its usefulness on a national or cross-population basis; however, the
factors motivating food choices are likely different for segments of
different socio-demographic prole within the wider population.
Materials and methods
Subjects and procedure
The research data are yielded from a sample of 997 Greek
households. Data are collected during the period MayJune 2006
by a professional research agency in Athens. The questionnaire
developed for data collection was self-administered, handed out
and collected by the agency upon completion by a person aged 18
and above in each household, in charge of grocery shopping or
sharing this responsibility equally with other members of the
household. Respondents mean age is 42.88 years (S.D. = 12.15).

C. Fotopoulos et al. / Appetite 52 (2009) 199208

Overall, the sample is nationally representative in terms of

education, income and geographic distribution (Table 1).
Material
The questionnaire used in the research comprises ve sections, one of which is the 7-point rated FCQ section (full version of
the questionnaire available upon request). The last section of the
questionnaire includes the socio-demographic prole of the
respondents.
The FCQ version that is used in the relevant section of the
questionnaire includes the initial 36 items developed by Steptoe
et al. (1995), already used in previous research in Greece
(Chryssohoidis et al., 2007). For the purposes of the present study,
however, the original FCQ is re-translated in Greek and back
translated in English by two independent translators to ensure
accuracy and maximise linguistic equivalence. Following the aims of
the research as described above, participants rated the importance
of the 36 FCQ items on a bipolar 7-point Likert type importance scale

201

with points as follows: 1 = extremely unimportant, 2 = unimportant, 3 = slightly unimportant, 4 = neither unimportant
nor important, 5 = slightly important, 6 = important and 7 =
extremely important.
It has been decided to use a bipolar 7-point scale instead of the
original unipolar 4-point one for two reasons: rst, to increase the
number of response options within items (i.e. from 4 to 7) and
thereby the opportunities to increase the variability of the
measurement scale, that is to increase the mere quality of the
scale (DeVellis, 1991); second, to take into account a central
neutral point as a means of avoiding a forced preference on behalf
of the subjects (DeVellis, 1991). The food choice decision-making is
a process well known for its complexity and, as such, it naturally
requires a substantial number of response options to allow
respondents more latitude in describing their level of opinion.
The use of 7-point Likert-type scales is not unseen in the food
choice motivation literature. Martins and Pliner (1998) report the
development of a 32-item FCQ-based scale (called Food Motivation
Scale) measured on 7-point Likert-type importance scales.

Table 1
Samples socio-demographic prole (%, N = 997).

1: Central (8%), Crete (8%), South-Central (4.7%), West (4.0%); 2: Temporarily unemployed, pupil/student, pensioner; 3: Entrepreneur or CEO (4.6%), worker/technician (4.4%),
pupil/student (2.8%), temporarily unemployed (1.6%), farmer (0.9%).

202

C. Fotopoulos et al. / Appetite 52 (2009) 199208

Moreover, Prescott et al. (2002) report the use of the FCQ measured
on 7-point Likert-type agreement scales. In both of these surveys,
the 7-point scales show satisfactory statistical properties; however, no effort has been made in either study to conrm the
statistical robustness of the FCQs factorial design when measured
on 7-point scales.
The descriptive statistics for the FCQ can be found in Table 2.
The scores on each of the nine FCQ dimensions are computed by
averaging item ratings per dimension.
Data analysis
Conrmatory factor analysis (CFA) is performed (LISREL 8.72) to
conrm and validate the factorial pattern suggested for the FCQ by
Steptoe et al. (1995). Many authors agree in the importance of a
priori theory before implementing CFA (Hurley et al., 1997),
whereas the use of exploratory factor analyses (EFA) is appropriate
for new or ad hoc measures (Conway & Huffcutt, 2003). In this
study, the measurement instrument is established a priori through
the FCQ. Consequently, it is meaningful to directly conrm its
original factorial design trough CFA.
The internal consistency of the various constructs is assessed by
Cronbach alpha coefcients (SPSS 15.0).
The general CFA models t is assessed by: (a) the chi-square
test as a descriptive goodness-of-t index for nested models; and
(b) the Comparative Fit Index (CFI), the Non-Normed Fit Index (TLINNFI) and the root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA).
To evaluate the parsimony of the hypothesized models, the
Parsimonious Normed Fit Index (PNFI) is used to compare nested
and non-nested 1st and 2nd-order models. Finally, the chi-square
difference test, the Akaikes Information Criterion (AIC) and the
Consistent Akaikes Information Criterion (CAIC) are applied to
compare two or more competing models estimated from the same
data.
Hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA) is performed at the nal
stage of the analyses (SPSS 15.0) to determine a number of
consumer segments (clusters) with different level of importance
assigned to the enhanced FCQs motivational factors, after the
enhanced FCQ models robustness being tested at the previous
stage of analyses. The enhanced FCQ motivational factors are thus
used as clustering criteria. Existence and number of the
statistically signicant differences among the emerging clusters
in terms of the importance assigned to the FCQ motivational
factors is assessed through post-hoc one-way ANOVA tests
(p < 0.05) performed at the cluster level. The selection of the
ideal clustering scenario (i.e. ideal number of clusters) is based on
the above statistically signicant differences, as well as on the
convergence between the hierarchical and the k-means solutions
per clustering scenario (Pearson correlations, p < 0.01). Finally,
statistically signicant socio-demographic differences among the
motivational clusters emerged are assessed through chi-square
tests at the cluster level (p < 0.05).
Analysis and results
Scale reliabilities and item statistics
As hypothesized in the original FCQ, the nine motivational
dimensions show moderate to good reliability (Cronbach alphas
from a = 0.61 to a = 0.82; see Table 2), with the exception of the
ethical concern dimension (a = 0.30), whereas the reliability of
the overall FCQ typology is also very high (a = 0.93). Not
surprisingly, the items 20, 32 and 19, which form the lowreliability ethical concern dimension, show the lowest item-tototal correlation (r). Correlations lower than 0.40 appear also in

Table 2
Descriptive statistics and reliabilities of the original FCQ with 7-point scales
(N = 997).
No.

FCQ item

Mean/S.D.

ra

It is important to me that the food I eat on a typical day :

1. Health
22
Contains a lot of vitamins and minerals
29
Keeps me healthy
10
Is nutritious
27
Is high in protein
30
Is good for my skin/teeth/hair/nails etc.
9
Is high in bre and roughage

5.77/1.08
5.92/1.06
5.83/1.09
5.44/1.27
5.00/1.24
5.49/1.09

0.62
0.63
0.61
0.40
0.36c
0.49

4.76/1.36
6.12/1.12
4.97/1.36
5.57/1.11
5.11/1.30
5.29/1.19

0.43
0.31c
0.53
0.41
0.53
0.61

5.12/1.42
5.18/1.34
5.19/1.37
5.41/1.20

0.56
0.57
0.61
0.36c

5.47/1.20

0.41

5.58/1.15
5.01/1.31
5.76/1.10
5.85/1.10

0.51
0.28c
0.52
0.50

6.03/1.12
5.76/1.08
5.88/1.17

0.58
0.59
0.66

5.50/1.18
5.42/1.22
5.73/1.06

0.55
0.58
0.49

5.14/1.31
5.10/1.24
5.36/1.32

0.74
0.67
0.60

5.46/1.10
4.93/1.45
4.99/1.41

0.32c
0.44
0.51

4.60/1.63
5.60/1.21
5.27/1.13

0.09c
0.19c
0.24c

FCQ mean: 5.39

r: 0.93

Cronbach a: 0.771
2. Mood
16
Helps me cope with stress
34
Helps me cope with life
26
Helps me relax
24
Keeps me awake/alert
13
Cheers me up
31
Makes me feel good
Cronbach a: 0.736
3. Convenience
1
Is easy to prepare
15
Can be cooked very simply
28
Takes no time to prepare
35
Can be bought in shops close to where
I live or work
11
Is easily available in shops and supermarkets
Cronbach a: 0.742
4. Sensory appeal
14
Smells nice
25
Looks nice
18
Has a pleasant texture
4
Tastes good
Cronbach a: 0.668
5. Natural content
2
Contains no additives
5
Contains natural ingredients
23
Contains no articial ingredients
Cronbach a: 0.779
6. Price
6
Is not expensive
36
Is cheap
12
Is good value for money
Cronbach a: 0.772
7. Weight control
3
Is low in calories
17
Helps me control my weight
7
Is low in fat
Cronbach a: 0.820
8. Familiarity
33
Is what I usually eat
8
Is familiar
21
Is like the food I ate when I was a child
Cronbach a: 0.613
9. Ethical concern
20
Comes from countries I approve of politically
32
Has the country of origin clearly marked
19
Is packaged in an environmentally friendly way
Cronbach a: 0.304

Key: Bold characters correspond to the highest means among FCQ variables and all
r > 0.60.
a
Item-total correlation.
b
7-point bipolar scale with end-points 1 = extremely unimportant and
7 = extremely important.
c
FCQ items with r < 0.40.

1131.45
224
0.064
0.96
0.78
0.96
1283.45
1732.21
4360.38
484
0.090
0.92
0.84
0.92
6164.74
6619.41
4218.11
480
0.088
0.93
0.83
0.92
5977.78
6456.06

6010.74

1403.08

203

5815.78
CFA6 vs. CFA7: 194.96
Chi-sq (5, 0.001): 20.52

B. 2nd-order CFAs

CFA6: 33 items
(excl. it. 19, 20, 32)
2 2nd order factors 8
1st order factors

CFA7: 33 items
(excl. it. 19, 20, 32) 1
2nd order factors
8 1st order factors

C. Adapted CFA

relation to a number of other items, such as item 30 of health;

item 34 of mood; item 35 of convenience; item 28 of sensory
appeal and item 33 of familiarity.
The average (un-weighted) importance assigned by the sample
to the 36 items is 5.39 in the 17 scale. At the individual item level,
the highest importance is assigned to the motives helps me cope
with life (6.12) and contains no additives (6.03), whereas the
motives keeps me healthy (5.92), contains no articial ingredients
(5.88), tastes good (5.85), and is nutritious (5.83) follow. For
exploratory purposes only, it is worth noting that the highest mean
importance is shown for natural content (5.98), and then for
convenience (5.68), health (5.57), sensory appeal (5.55) and
price (5.55). Moreover, mood is the most controversial
construct in terms of assigned importance, since it combines both
the highest and the second-lower scoring items of the whole FCQ.
Furthermore, the lowest importance is assigned to ethical
concern (5.16) and familiarity (5.03).
Overall, the 36 FCQ variables are only slightly non-normal, with
skewness and kurtosis lower or quite close to j1j, in spite of some
indices uctuating from higher than j1j, up to around j1.5j for
skewness and j2.7j for kurtosis (results available upon request).

CFA8: 24 items (excl.

items 30, 27, 34, 24, 35,
11, 25, 12, 33, 19, 20,
32) 8 1st order factors

C. Fotopoulos et al. / Appetite 52 (2009) 199208

3791.16
467
0.085
0.94
0.84
0.93
5422.73
5977.77
4036.48
517
0.083
0.94
0.81
0.93
5818.72
6485.96
4179.76
542
0.082
0.94
0.80
0.93
6002.25
6734.44
4473.45
558
0.084
0.93
0.82
0.92
6365.89
7003.60
SBS Chi-sq
Df
RMSEA
CFI
PNFI
TLI-NNFI
AIC
CAIC

4080.64
524
0.083
0.94
0.82
0.93
5875.96
6501.87

4435.96

5592.72
CFA4 vs. CFA5: 245.32
Chi-sq (50, 0.001): 86.66
5754.25
CFA3 vs. CFA4: 161.5
Chi-sq (25, 0.001): 52.62
CFA3 vs. CFA5: 1318.29
Chi-sq (75, 0.001): 118.60
5663.96
CFA2 vs. CFA3: 90.2
Chi-sq (18, 0.001): 42.3
CFA2 vs. CFA4: 71.2
Chi-sq (7, 0.001): 24.3
6149.89

N  chi-sq
D(N  chi-sq)

CFA4: 35 items
(excl. it. 20)
8 factors 2 items
CFA3: 36 items
8 factors 3 items
CFA2: 35 items
(excl. item 20)
9 factors
CFA1:
36 items
9 factors

A. 1st-order CFAs
Goodness-of-t index

2nd-order CFAs
The presence of substantial correlations at the 1st-order factor
levels of CFAs 15 might point out to the existence of higher-order
factors (Fabricar, Wegener, MacCallum, & Strahan, 1999). A
hierarchical sequence of nested partial 2nd-order CFAs is therefore
implemented (CFAs 6 and 7), based on the previously described
1st-order CFA5 model and its estimated correlations.

Table 3
Progress of CFAs conducted on the original FCQ with 7-point scales (N = 997).

1st-order CFAs
Even though the non-normality of the data is only slight, the
selected method of CFA model estimation is Maximum Likelihood
(LISREL 8.72) with its robust correction for non-normality (Robust
Maximum Likelihood RML; Satorra & Bentler, 1994). The t of the
original 36-item CFA measured in 7-point scales hereafter called
CFA1 is marginally accepted (Table 3A). Moreover, most of the
standardized factor loadings result adequate, ranging from 0.47 to
0.87 (cut-off levels from 0.50 to 0.95 are adequate to assess
convergent validity; Kline, 2005). However, the loadings of some
items are quite low (e.g. item 16 = 0.39, item 25 = 0.40 or item
35 = 0.42), while a zero correlation appears for item 20: comes from
countries I approve of politically. The latter result should be
expected for the ethical concern dimension because of its
relatively low reliability a and low item-total correlation r that
affect its internal validity (see Table 2). Furthermore, many of the
estimated correlations at the factor level are higher than 0.85, not
satisfying CFA1s discriminant validity (Kline, 2005).
Based on the above outcome of CFA1, the most natural step
forward is to focus on the problematic ethical concern
motivational dimension. A hierarchical sequence of nested CFAs
is then implemented, as follows: (a) by excluding item 20 due to its
zero correlation with the ethical concern dimension (CFA2); (b)
by separating the ethical dimension into the three items it is
comprised of (i.e. items 20, 32 and 19; CFA3); (c) by combining a
and b above (i.e. excluding item 20 and considering items 32 and
19 as separate ethical concern-related sub-dimensions; CFA4); and
(d) by excluding the three items that from ethical concern all
together (CFA5). Nevertheless, all models goodness-of-t indices
remain marginal (see Table 3A), whereas many of the estimated
correlations at the factor level are still higher than 0.85, not
satisfying discriminant validity (correlation matrices of CFAs 15
available upon request).

CFA5: 33 items
(excl. it. 19, 20 32)
8 factors

Conrmatory factor analyses (CFAs)

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C. Fotopoulos et al. / Appetite 52 (2009) 199208

Fig. 1. Path diagram, adapted CFA8, 24-item FCQ with 7-point scales (N = 997).

As shown in Table 3B, CFA6 again shows modest statistical

properties. However, the convergent validity of the model is
satisfactory, with the large majority of the 1st-order standardized
factor loadings being higher than 0.50. Moreover, discriminant
validity can be assessed at the 2nd-order level, with the
correlations among the 2nd-order factors being lower or slightly
higher than 0.85; however, many of the correlations among the
1st-order factors result higher than 0.85, disconrming discriminant validity of the model at the 1st-order level. This line of
thought leads to the subsequent CFA7 model, which shows
improved discriminant validity at both the 1st and the 2nd-order
levels, even though its goodness-of-t indices result slightly worse
than those of CFA6 (correlation matrices of CFAs 67 available
upon request).

underlying structures of the new factorial design (results available

upon request), since EFA is appropriate for new or ad hoc measures
(Conway & Huffcutt, 2003), as mentioned before. All EFAs are
conducted with the Maximum Likelihood estimation method and
the oblique rotation. Items with item-to-total correlation (r) lower
than 0.40 and items that do not load clearly on one factor are
discarded. As expected, excluding several items from each factor
leads to improved reliability (e.g. health: a = 0.78, mood:
a = 0.74, convenience: a = 0.79, sensory appeal: a = 0.71, and
familiarity: a = 0.63). The last step then is to conrm the
robustness of the adapted factorial structure through CFA (hereafter called CFA8, Fig. 1). CFA8s goodness-of-t indices can be
found in Table 3C, whereas the discriminant validity of the model
can be assessed from Table 4.2

Computation of an adapted FCQ version

In an effort to improve the statistical properties of the FCQ
factorial structure, the possibility for the ad hoc existence of a
shorter model is nally examined (i.e. fewer items loading on 8 of
the original FCQ dimensions, excluding ethical concern).
Signicant effort is also put into balancing convergent and
discriminant validity of the shorter model. With this conditions
in mind, a series of EFAs is conducted (SPSS 15.0) to explore the

2
A two-item ethical concern dimension (by excluding the clearly unrelated
item 20) can be maintained in an adapted 26-item FCQ version, with equally
satisfactory goodness-of-t indices but worse discriminant validity (results
available upon request). However, as postulated by the Lindeman and Vaananen
(2000) work and conrmed by the present results, the ethical concern dimension
as formulated in the original FCQ version remains problematic and its inclusion in a
food choice motivation typology merits careful consideration.

C. Fotopoulos et al. / Appetite 52 (2009) 199208

Table 4
Correlations of the adapted CFA model, 24-item FCQ with 7-point scales (N = 997).
CFA8: 24-items in eight factors
Factors

1. H

2. M

3. C

4. SA

5. NC

6. P

7. WC

8. F

1.H
2. M
3. C
4. SA
5. NC
6. P
7. WC
8. F

1.00
0.50
0.50
0.88*
0.95*
0.65
0.46
0.39

1.00
0.54
0.62
0.50
0.53
0.40
0.68

1.00
0.41
0.36
0.52
0.52
0.46

1.00
0.83
0.59
0.23
0.46

1.00
0.62
0.46
0.36

1.00
0.37
0.48

1.00
0.27

1.00

*: Represents correlations between FCQ factors larger than 0.85 that do not satisfy
discriminant validity. Key: H: health; M: mood; C: convenience; SA: sensory appeal;
NC: natural content; P: price; WC: weight control; F: familiarity.

Hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA)

The nal stage of the analysis is the implementation of
a motivation-based segmentation task. Grouping criteria are
the eight motivational factors emerging through CFA8. After the
initial implementation of hierarchical cluster analysis with the

205

option of identifying 37 clusters (SPSS 15.0), follows the k-means

procedure on the hierarchical clusters centroids for each of the 3
7 clusters scenario. The four-cluster scenario is nally selected
as the one with the highest number of statistically signicant
food selection motives discriminating the four clusters in pairwised comparisons (Duncan and Scheffe post-hoc ANOVA tests,
p < 0.05) and the highest correlation between the hierarchical and
the k-means cluster membership variables (Pearson correlation
0.84, p < 0.01). In order to develop the socio-demographic prole
of each cluster, a cross-tabulation process took place between the
cluster membership variable and the socio-demographic variables (chi-square tests, p < 0.05). Nine out of 13 socio-demographic variables are found to clearly discriminate among the four
clusters (p < 0.05). The prole of each cluster can be seen in
Table 5.
It is worth highlighting that the eight motivational factors
exhibit very strong discriminating power also in the scenarios of 3,
5, 6 and 7 clusters (Table 6). Moreover, the socio-demographic
prole of the clusters in each of those scenarios can also be clearly
drawn, since the majority of the relevant variables exhibits
statistically signicant differences among the clusters in each
scenario (chi-square tests, p < 0.05).

Table 5
Motivational cluster proles, statistically signicant differences (%, N = 997).

Key: Bold characters correspond to the higher gures and italicised gures correspond to the lower gures among clusters. 1: 7-point bipolar scale with end-points
1 = extremely unimportant and 7 = extremely important.
*
Duncan and Scheffe post-hoc paired ANOVA tests, p < 0.05.
**
Chi-square tests, p < 0.05.
+
Not statistically signicant differences in cluster pair-wised comparisons, ANOVA tests, p < 0.05.

206

C. Fotopoulos et al. / Appetite 52 (2009) 199208

Table 6
Process of the hierarchical cluster analysis, scenarios of 47 clusters (N = 997).

Key: H: health; M: mood; C: convenience; SA: sensory appeal; NC: natural content; P: price; WC: weight control; F: familiarity. 1: Duncan and Scheffe post-hoc ANOVA test
between each pair of clusters in each scenario in terms of importance assigned to the eight motivational factors (p < 0.05). 2: Correlation between the hierarchical cluster
membership and the k-means cluster membership variables (k-means cluster analysis implemented on hierarchical cluster centroids) (p < 0.01).

Discussion
For the participants to the present research, the FCQ appears to
represent a realistic typology of general food selection-related
motives and a comprehensive and easily administrated research
instrument, as concluded by the high mean importance scores
assigned to individual motives, as well as to the overall
instrument-usually higher than 5 in the 17 scale. Compared to
the results from the normative Steptoe et al. (1995) sample, the
Greek consumers seem to attach high importance to more or less
the same motivational dimensions (i.e. convenience, health,
sensory appeal and price); however, the importance assigned
to foods natural content is the highest among all motives. This
result could possibly be the outcome of more than a decade of food
scares since the original Steptoe et al. (1995) research was
conducted, a time period that has shifted consumer attention
closer to food safety-related issues internationally.
Except for the ethical concern dimension, the FCQ also
appears to be a quite reliable research instrument both in parts, as
well as a whole. However, compared to the values reported by
Steptoe et al. (1995) for their normative sample, in the present
sample almost all motivational scales (except for weight control)
show different (lower) reliability indices.3 Overall, the ndings of
the present research conrm the observation that the reliability
values for the UK sample reported by Steptoe et al. (1995) tend to
be higher than those for other western populations, such as the
Canadian, Italian and Belgian samples, as reported by Eertmans
et al. (2006). Nevertheless, this deviation from the original does not

3
Equality of reliabilities of the FCQ scales is tested between the present sample
and the normative Steptoe et al. (1995) sample with the method of Van de Vijver
and Leung (in Eertmans et al., 2006), that is . . .by computing (1  a1)/(1  a2),
where a1 is the reliability obtained for the rst sample and a2 the reliability of the
second sample. When the resulting value exceeded the critical value of the F distribution
with numerator df1 = N1  1 and denominator df2 = N2  1 (N1 being the size of the rst
sample and N2 the size of the second sample), the hypothesis of equal reliabilities was
rejected . . . Equality was tested at the p < 0.01 signicance level. . . (Eertmans et al.,
2006, p. 346). For example, regarding the internal consistency of sensory appeal,
the comparison yielded a value of (1  0.66)/(1  0.72) or 1.21, which exceeded the
critical F-value at the p < 0.01 level (with df1 = 996 and df2 = 357).

alter the quite satisfactory reliability of the instrument for the

Greek sample.
At the individual item level, item-total correlations are lower
than the threshold of r = 0.40 for more items in the present
research (9/36) than it is the case for the Canadian (3/36), Belgian
(4/36) and Italian (6/36) samples (see Eertmans et al., 2006, p. 347).
However, no persisting pattern can be observed in these low
correlations across countries. For instance, item 4: tastes good that
appears weakly correlated with the sensory appeal dimension in
the Canadian, Italian and Belgian samples does not follow this
trend in the Greek sample. On the contrary, item 34: helps me cope
with life that is weakly correlated with the mood dimension also
shows very high mean and quite low standard deviation,
suggesting a ceiling effect and skewed distribution of ratings,
which is conrmed to a certain extent by additional statistics
(skewness = 1.48, kurtosis = 2.37).
Moreover, from the overall pattern of reliabilities and itemtotal correlations, it gets clear that the ethical concern dimension
shows particularly low internal consistency, an observation that is
unique to the present sample. This observation is conrmed
through the models CFA1CFA5: eventual exclusion of the ethical
concern components individually or as a whole results to a
noticeable improvement at an acceptable level for most of models
t indices and a considerable improvement of models discriminant validity. Although direct comparisons are not possible
between the present and past efforts, it is plausible to hypothesise
that the use of more rich in variance generation, bipolar scales
might have revealed similar weaknesses in other FCQ applications.
Furthermore, the above line of thought points out to the need for
the development of a more robust motivational scale with
possibly fewer dimensions or fewer items per dimension,
validated across wider and more country-representative samples
than the ones used so far in the literature.
A further result that adds to the above suggestion is the lack of
discriminant validity of the various FCQ models, even upon
exclusion of the ethical concern dimension (i.e. model CFA5). The
absence of discriminant validity among specic FCQ dimensions
(e.g. familiarity with mood; natural content with health
and sensory appeal; and sensory appeal with health and

C. Fotopoulos et al. / Appetite 52 (2009) 199208

mood) is supported by the 2nd-order CFA models (CFA6 and

CFA7), showing the existence of some higher-abstraction dimensions behind those originally conrmed by Steptoe et al. (1995). It
thus seems that the initial FCQ dimensions could be reduced to as
much as ve or maybe four. For instance, the ve-dimension FCQ
version could be formed by: (a) a 2nd-order dimension indicatively
termed health and safety concern composed by the FCQ
dimensions health and natural content; (b) an additional 2ndorder dimension indicatively termed expected pleasure
composed by the FCQ dimensions sensory appeal, mood and
familiarity; and (c) the three remaining FCQ dimensions
convenience, price and weight control.
Even further collapsing of the 2nd-order motivations health
and safety concern and expected pleasure could be considered,
as indicated by CFA7, forming a four-dimension FCQ version,
though such a conclusion might be hard to support from a theorydriven, psychometric point of view. The psychometric view can
also stimulate some other ideas about the development of shorter
FCQ versions, such as a three-dimension version formed by
merging: (a) weight control with health and natural content
(dimension 1); (b) sensory appeal with mood and familiarity
(dimension 2); and (c) price with convenience (dimension 3).
However, this line of thought is not supported by the correlations
of the relevant constructs of CFA5. For instance, weight control
does correlate signicantly but not strongly with any other FCQ
dimension; moreover, convenience and price are correlated
with each other only moderately, not supporting their merging to a
higher order dimension.
Nevertheless, one has to keep in mind that all the above 1st or
2nd order approaches (i.e. CFA1CFA7), either computational or
theoretical/psychometrical, do not exhibit but only marginally
accepted statistical properties in terms of main goodness-of-t
indices and discriminant validity. The adapted CFA8 model,
however, denitely points out to the need for excluding redundant
items from the original FCQ dimensions. This ad hoc FCQ version
shows quite robust statistical properties and signicantly
improved discriminant validity, with only two factors showing
correlations higher than 0.85. Again, this discrepancy could either
point out to the existence of a higher order factor or-mainly-that
health and natural content could be considered as one
dimension in a revised FCQ.
On the other hand, the results of HCA bring about an optimistic
message for the FCQs ability to predict food selection behaviour at
the subpopulation level. Four clusters with clearly discriminated
socio-demographic prole (clusters that represent segments of
unequal size and market prospects) assign different level of
importance to different FCQ motivational factors. More specically
(see Table 5):
More-than-average educated and better off consumers, who
live far from very large urban centres more than the sample
average (cluster 1) assign higher than average importance to all
FCQ motivational factors (and the highest of all clusters, with the
exception of convenience), and especially to nutritional
content and health, and then to sensory appeal, price and
convenience.
Rather average consumers, but with lower-than-average
income (cluster 2), assign little average importance to all FCQ
motivational factors (and lower than that of the overall sample per
motive). However, they assign quite high importance to nutritional content, health and sensory appeal, but they are
indifferent towards familiarity and mood.
Low educated, somewhat older, more male and less into fulltime employee jobs consumers (cluster 3) also assign little
average importance to all FCQ motivational factors. However,
they assign the highest and the second higher of all clusters (and

207

higher than samples average) importance to sensory appeal

and nutritional content, but the lowest and the second lower of
all clusters importance to convenience and weight control,
respectively.
Finally, younger, single, urban, low-than-average educated,
more into full-time employee jobs consumers (cluster 4) are at best
indifferent towards all FCQ motivational factors, while they nd
mood, weight control and familiarity in particular to be
rather unimportant food selection motives.
From the above it gets apparent that a tailor-made marketing
strategy based on different combinations of food selection motives
can have a substantial impact on as much as 90% of the market
(clusters 13). Moreover, a further encouraging message for the
predictive ability of the FCQ at the subpopulation level constitutes
the nding that relevant motivation-based strategies could be also
successful in more fragmented markets, as the successful FCQbased segmentation into more than four clusters indicates (see
Table 6).
Conclusion
Empirical data of the present research do not support the
robustness of the original 36-item FCQ as such even upon
exclusion of the problematic ethical concern dimension; neither
do they conrm the formation of higher-abstraction dimensions
based on a more logical psychometric restructuring of the
original FCQ constructs. This inherent controversy between
empirical evidence and reasoned, theory-based assumptions about
more concrete versions seems to lie in the heart of the
problematic behaviour of the original FCQ, which is not altered
by the adoption of 7-point bipolar scales either.
Results at the subpopulation level, however, indicate that some
of the basic concepts of the original FCQ (i.e. sensory appeal and
mood, or natural content and health) can form the basis for a new
motivational typology. It is, therefore, reasonable to claim that
future research towards developing an enhanced, FCQ-originated
general food motivation typology, which would incorporate fewer,
of higher abstraction level dimensions and fewer items per
dimension, is a right step forward.
Such an enhanced motivational typology, however, must be
supplemented by a number of food selection constructs that are
apparently missing from the current FCQ conceptual framework.
Such currently overlooked concepts can be various multidimensional constructs, such as: (a) general food safety perceptions,
with emphasis put on the microbial dimension, not just the
chemical component of safety; (b) ethical concerns, with
emphasis put on the environmental protection and overall
green consumption attitudes; (c) various personality traits
similar to the FCQs familiarity, such as variety seeking,
innovativeness, loyalty, involvement etc.; (d) food purchasing context-related constructs apart from convenience,
such as satisfaction in a specic retail outlet, etc.; and (e)
quality consciousness and use of label cues, such as brand
name inuences, search for quality assurances, etc. Nevertheless,
such a step should be theory-driven-thus taken a priori and not
be the outcome of an ad hoc data-driven statistical process, as well
as the outcome of rigorous cross-national statistical testing and
validation.
Acknowledgement
The authors wish to express their gratitude to the Greek
Ministry of Agricultural Development and Food for the nancial
support provided for the accomplishment of this survey.

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C. Fotopoulos et al. / Appetite 52 (2009) 199208

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