Effects of University Students’ Perceived Food Literacy on Ecological Eating Behavior towards Sustainability

Yoojin Lee, Taehee Kim and Hyosun Jung
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Yoojin Lee: Smart Education Platform, KyungHee University, Seoul 02447, Korea
Taehee Kim: Smart Education Platform, KyungHee University, Seoul 02447, Korea
Hyosun Jung: Center for Converging Humanities, KyungHee University, Seoul 02447, Korea

Sustainability, 2022, vol. 14, issue 9, 1-15

Abstract: Due to the COVID-19 pandemic and industrialized food systems, people’s eating behavior has become seriously restricted. Especially, university students have started to overly depend on processed foods and carnivorous diets, and it places a huge burden on society by inducing the deterioration of health and environmental sustainability. Therefore, this study was undertaken to examine the effects of university students’ perceived food literacy on ecological eating behavior towards sustainability. A total of 395 university students in South Korea participated in this research. First, students’ food literacy components, which are reading labels and budgeting, healthy snack styles, healthy food stockpiling and resilience and resistance, exert positive influences on ecological eating behavior; second, the other two components, which are food preparation skills and social and conscious eating, have no positive impact on ecological eating behavior. Finally, the influences of food literacy on ecological behavior are significantly moderated by gender differences. This suggests that strengthening university students’ food literacy through education is necessary to promote ecological eating behaviors and advance the development of sustainable society.

Keywords: food literacy; ecological eating behavior; sustainability; university students (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
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