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A comparative investigation between functional foods and their alternatives with respect to medical claims made
Author(s) -
Harrison Catherine,
Brown Ian
Publication year - 2003
Publication title -
international journal of consumer studies
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.775
H-Index - 71
eISSN - 1470-6431
pISSN - 1470-6423
DOI - 10.1046/j.1470-6431.2003.00308_4.x
Subject(s) - functional food , plant sterols , business , marketing , disease , risk analysis (engineering) , function (biology) , food products , medicine , food science , cholesterol , biology , sterol , pathology , evolutionary biology
This study sets out to investigate claims made by manufacturers regarding the medical benefits of some functional foods. A range of functional foods has come onto the market, providing the potential for customers to tailor their food choices more closely to their needs, providing they understand how to incorporate the appropriate products into their diet. Claims regarding beneficial effects include: prevention or reduced risk of a symptom or disease such as osteoporosis with those foods enriched with calcium, enhancement of the digestive system by using probiotic yoghurt drinks or the treatment of disease by introducing plant sterols to reduce LDL cholesterol and thus the risk of heart disease. Data were collected from the nutritional information provided by the manufacturers and analysed comparatively by contrasting the functional food with their ‘everyday’ alternative, which do not make any special claims. Results show that in the majority of cases the actual claims made by the manufacturer were not substantiated and actually proved misleading and deceptive. It was considered that most products were over‐rated with regard to price and function. The work concludes that whilst functional foods are now established on the market in many cases the claims are not substantiated and in some cases products have been withdrawn.