From Sustainability Consciousness to Sustainable Dietary Behaviours: The Mediating Roles of Food Waste and Food...

In shaping sustainable dietary habits, the structural dynamics of the food system may play a role as significant as the individual's cognitive processes. This study aims to examine how sustainability awareness among Turkish adults relates to their dietary behaviours and to identify the mediating mechanisms involved in this relationship. In doing so, it seeks to contribute to the identification of potential leverage points within the food system.

This cross-sectional study was conducted with the participation of 784 healthy adults living in Izmir. The study examined the relationships between the sub-dimensions of sustainability awareness and sustainable dietary behaviours, and two different mediating pathways were tested. The Sustainability Consciousness Questionnaire and the Behaviours Scale Towards Sustainable Nutrition were utilised during the data collection process.

Of the participants, 58.5% were women, and the mean age was 32.50 ± 12.91. It was found that 55% of the participants were unfamiliar with the concept of sustainable nutrition. In the Spearman correlation analysis, a positive and statistically significant association of small to moderate magnitude was found between sustainability consciousness and sustainable dietary behaviours (r = 0.292, p< 0.01). This association was strongest in the environmental attitude (r = 0.310) and environmental behaviour (r = 0.307) sub-dimensions. Mediational analyses showed that the association between environmental attitude and sustainable dietary behaviour was statistically accounted for by food waste reduction behaviour (indirect effect B = 10.126; standardised effect = 0.303). Economic attitude was associated with sustainable dietary behaviour both directly (B = 1.999, p = 0.009) and indirectly through food preference behaviour (B = 3.921, standardised effect = 0.091), although this indirect association was small in magnitude. These findings indicate that the different subdimensions of sustainability awareness are linked to sustainable dietary behaviours through distinct pathways.

These findings suggest that food waste reduction may serve as a practical link between environmental attitudes and everyday dietary practices and may therefore represent a promising point of intervention within the food system, although the observed associations were small to moderate in size and the cross-sectional design precludes causal inference. When considered within a systems-based approach to nutrition, the results imply that interventions are likely to be more effective when they address several levels of the food system at the same time. In this regard, educational initiatives aimed at developing sustainable dietary literacy at the individual level could be combined with structural and policy measures that make sustainable food options more accessible and economically viable. Such a multi-level approach may help to narrow the gap between attitudes and behaviour and to support more lasting change in dietary patterns.