The influence of health involvement and satisfaction on healthy food choices among people over 60 years

With increased longevity in Europe, diet quality in later life is increasingly important. The aim of this study was to understand views on the consumption of fruit, raw and cooked vegetables held by a sample (n = 258) of people over 60 years randomly recruited in Italy. Data were gathered by self‐completed questionnaires and the results analysed to assess the causal relationship between selected variables predicting the consumption of fruit and vegetables. Generally, respondents had good health involvement (i.e. health had personal relevance and importance was attached to health issues) and they claimed knowledge of the relationship between health and consumption of fruit and vegetables. Their expressed feelings of satisfaction (i.e. positive feelings towards and from consumption) were the most important predictor of consumption for fruit, raw and cooked vegetables. Despite high levels of interest in healthy eating, health involvement was not found to motivate healthy consumption behaviour. This may have important implications for the way that health promotion campaigns are conceptualized and designed.