Abstract
The purpose of this study was to investigate attitude and behavior of eating and purchasing seafood in relation to eating pattern at the household level among Korean housewives. Analysis data from 676 housewives in Korea were collected with self-administered questionnaires. The results were as follows: Seventy-three % of the respondents answered that they liked seafood dishes for their taste, good nutrition and health benefit in order, but 3.2% disliked seafoods because of their bad smell, cooking difficulties and high prices. In comparison with the meat dishes, seafoods were considered superior to meat in nutritional value(49.9%), health aspect(46.4%) and taste(42.4%) but seafood stuffs were evaluated inferior to meat in the aspects of preparation process(43.9%), sanitational problems(40.4%) and higher price(35.2%). The favorite fish cooking methods of housewives turned out to be grilling, stewing, eating as raw fish, braising and frying in order. The 74.7% of respondents evaluated that their family preferred seafood dishes, but 37.2% of the subjects prepared seafood dishes 1-2 times a week followed by 3-4 times a week(24.0%), 2-3 times a month(19.6%), once a month(7.4%) and more than once a day(5.3%). The frequency rate of seafood preparation showed significant differences according to the monthly income of the household(p<0.05), the higher the income, the higher the frequency rate. As for the difficulties in preparing seafood dishes, cumbersome processes before cooking(45.4%), high price(10.4%) and sanitational problems of distribution(9.9%) were indicated showing significant differences among the age groups of the subjects(p<0.01). These findings revealed that younger generation housewife group is the major target in promoting seafood consumption at household level. We suggest to develop convenient sale packages and continuing education programs with information about easy handling and preparation of seafoods for the promotion of home cooking.
