From protection to rejection: the role of parental protection motivation in pre-prepared food consumption.
- 1Faculty of Economics, Business School, Liaoning University, Shenyang, China.
- 2Faculty of Economics, Asia-Australia Business College, Liaoning University, Shenyang, China.
Abstract
Pre-prepared foods are increasingly popular because of their convenience but have also raised concerns about food safety and nutritional risks. Drawing on the evolutionary needs perspective and protection motivation theory, this study examines the association between parental protection motivation and consumers' purchase intention toward pre-prepared foods, as well as the mediating role of perceived risk and the moderating roles of health consciousness and information sensitivity in the mediation process. A cross-sectional online survey was conducted with 985 Chinese consumers. Confirmatory factor analysis in AMOS 28.0 assessed the measurement model, while PROCESS Model 4 and two Model 7 analyses in SPSS 30.0, using 5,000 bootstrap resamples, tested mediation and moderated mediation, respectively. Parental protection motivation was negatively associated with purchase intention toward pre-prepared foods (β = -0.173, p < 0.001). Perceived risk significantly mediated this relationship [indirect effect = -0.280, 95% CI (-0.372, -0.196)]. The indices of moderated mediation were significant for both health consciousness [index = -0.185, 95% CI (-0.282, -0.112)] and information sensitivity [index = 0.066, 95% CI (0.016, 0.123)]. The mediating effect was significant at high but not low levels of health consciousness, whereas it was significant at low but not high levels of information sensitivity. Parental protection motivation was associated with lower purchase intention through perceived risk, and this mediating effect was stronger at higher levels of health consciousness but weaker at higher levels of information sensitivity. These findings deepen the protection-oriented explanation of parenting-related motives in consumer behavior and complement research on pre-prepared food consumption by directing attention beyond proximate explanations toward an ultimate-level motivational antecedent.
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BibTeX
@article{yuan2026from,
title = {{From protection to rejection: the role of parental protection motivation in pre-prepared food consumption.}},
author = {Shaofeng Yuan and Weike Wu and Yidan Ma},
journal = {Frontiers in psychology},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2026.1928184},
url = {https://europepmc.org/article/MED/42952704},
note = {CC BY},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - From protection to rejection: the role of parental protection motivation in pre-prepared food consumption.
AU - Shaofeng Yuan
AU - Weike Wu
AU - Yidan Ma
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/14
JO - Frontiers in psychology
DO - 10.3389/fpsyg.2026.1928184
UR - https://europepmc.org/article/MED/42952704
AB - Pre-prepared foods are increasingly popular because of their convenience but have also raised concerns about food safety and nutritional risks. Drawing on the evolutionary needs perspective and protection motivation theory, this study examines the association between parental protection motivation and consumers' purchase intention toward pre-prepared foods, as well as the mediating role of perceived risk and the moderating roles of health consciousness and information sensitivity in the mediation process. A cross-sectional online survey was conducted with 985 Chinese consumers. Confirmatory factor analysis in AMOS 28.0 assessed the measurement model, while PROCESS Model 4 and two Model 7 analyses in SPSS 30.0, using 5,000 bootstrap resamples, tested mediation and moderated mediation, respectively. Parental protection motivation was negatively associated with purchase intention toward pre-prepared foods (β = -0.173, p < 0.001). Perceived risk significantly mediated this relationship [indirect effect = -0.280, 95% CI (-0.372, -0.196)]. The indices of moderated mediation were significant for both health consciousness [index = -0.185, 95% CI (-0.282, -0.112)] and information sensitivity [index = 0.066, 95% CI (0.016, 0.123)]. The mediating effect was significant at high but not low levels of health consciousness, whereas it was significant at low but not high levels of information sensitivity. Parental protection motivation was associated with lower purchase intention through perceived risk, and this mediating effect was stronger at higher levels of health consciousness but weaker at higher levels of information sensitivity. These findings deepen the protection-oriented explanation of parenting-related motives in consumer behavior and complement research on pre-prepared food consumption by directing attention beyond proximate explanations toward an ultimate-level motivational antecedent.
SN - 1664-1078
ER -