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Emerging Technologies for Investigating Food Consumer Behavior: A Systematic Review
Kyriaki Kechri1, Christina Kleisiari1, Leonidas Sotirios Kyrgiakos1
1Department of Agriculture, Crop Production and Rural Environment, University of Thessaly, Volos, Greece.
Comprehensive Reviews in Food Science and Food Safety
|November 17, 2025
Summary
Emerging technologies like AI and VR offer new ways to study food consumer behavior, overcoming limitations of traditional methods. Future research should integrate these with qualitative approaches and address ethical concerns for better insights.
Area of Science:
- Food Science
- Consumer Behavior Research
- Technology Adoption
Background:
- Traditional methods for studying food consumer behavior (e.g., questionnaires) are often costly, time-consuming, and prone to bias.
- Evolving food preferences necessitate innovative research approaches to understand consumer behavior effectively.
Purpose of the Study:
- To systematically review the literature on the application of emerging technologies in understanding food consumer behavior.
- To assess the potential and limitations of technologies like AI, VR, SMA, and Big Data in food consumption research.
- To explore consumer attitudes towards these novel technologies in the food sector.
Main Methods:
- Systematic literature review adhering to PRISMA guidelines.
- Identification and inclusion of 159 eligible articles from an initial pool of 628 records.
- Analysis of studies examining technological innovations' impact on food trends, consumption preferences, and consumer attitudes.
Main Results:
- Big Data, Social Media Analytics (SMA), and transactional analytics provide large-scale, real-time data on consumer behavior.
- Machine Learning (ML) enhances data analysis, enabling predictive capabilities and personalized marketing.
- Virtual Reality (VR) offers realistic simulations for studying purchasing behaviors, overcoming traditional method limitations.
- Most technology-based studies are quantitative, potentially limiting in-depth understanding.
Conclusions:
- Emerging technologies offer significant potential for advancing food consumer behavior research.
- Challenges include automated data interpretation, VR sensory limitations, user unfamiliarity, and data privacy concerns.
- Future research should prioritize technological advancement, usability, ethical frameworks, and integration of qualitative methods.
