consumers; (2) consumer preferences including preferences for various cuts, for different
sensory attributes (freshness, color, and fat content), and for health and risk attributes
(cholesterol, free from chemicals, and USDA label, etc.); (3) ways of cooking such as
broil, roast, and barbeque; (4) dishes made from goat meat, including soup, meat sauce,
chili, and meat loaf; (5) consumption of other meats such as beef, pork, chicken, turkey,
lamb, and fish; (6) demographic characteristics such as gender, age, race affiliation,
household size, and family structure; (7) socioeconomic factors such as education and
household income; (8) marketing tools such as food page advertisement, store display,
price specials, in-supermarket taste test, safety assurance, convenient products.
The major variables of interest and available in the survey are as follows:
(1) Ethnic and religious identity Religion and race affiliation of consumers were
regarded as factors of importance in the determination of goat meat consumption. The
race variable in this survey was designed multiple levels: White, African American, black
not African American, Hispanic, Asian, and other multi-racial race affiliation. More
variables related are the origin of the minority groups (Mexican descent, Cuban descent,
Puerto Rican Descent, Spanish), the length of time away from original culture, and the
number of generation of immigrant. Those variables, although very informative, may not
be retained in the model because of the short of responses.
(2) Real Income The impact of income on consumption could never be down played.
High income was believed to lead to more consumption. However, previous studies did
not identify close relationships between goat meat consumption and real income. The
results may not be generally true for minority groups or in a narrower income domain.
Hypothetically, real income would affect the consumption of goat meat on some niche