Hamburger Doneness and Consumer Preference

Overview

To reduce foodborne illness, USDA recommends that consumers cook hamburgers thoroughly and order them thoroughly cooked in restaurants. To design and target effective consumer education, food safety educators need information about the tradeoffs consumers face when making food safety behavior changes. ERS purchased data from the Market Research Corporation of America for an in-depth case study of consumer food safety behavior, Consumer Food Safety Behavior: A Case Study in Hamburger Cooking and Ordering.

The Hamburger Doneness and Consumer Preferences data report consumers' preferences for how thoroughly they like their hamburgers cooked, their perceptions of the risks of foodborne illness, the perceived sensory characteristics of hamburgers cooked to different degrees of doneness, cooking methods, and consumers' sources of information about food safety. The data were prepared from responses to two modules of a national mail survey conducted in 1996.

The two modules, entitled Hamburger and Egg Consumption Diary and the Hamburger Preparation Quiz, were conducted as supplements to MRCA's Menu Census Survey. This data product is targeted to researchers who wish to conduct independent analyses of the data.

Data Files

The Hamburger Doneness and Consumer Preferences data files provide information from two 1996 national survey modules on consumer doneness choices, cooking methods, attitudes toward foodborne illness and sensory characteristics of hamburgers, and food safety information sources. This data product is a set of two data files in ASCII text format. For information on how to use the data, see documentation and instructions.

Hamburger and Egg Consumption Diary

Data on hamburger doneness and cooking methods for hamburgers eaten in the last two weeks, along with demographic data for respondents.

• Space delimited data file.
• Documentation and instructions.

Hamburger Preparation Quiz

Data on hamburger doneness preferences and other attitudes toward the risk of foodborne illness and sensory characteristics of hamburgers, along with demographic data for respondents.

• Space delimited data file.
• Documentation and instructions.

Release Date

May, 2002.