The insectivore's dilemma, and how to take the West out of it

- Protein and fat-rich insects seen as a promising food solution by international agencies.
- Current strategies identify the cultural representation of insects as disgusting as main obstacle.
- Arguments about environmental or nutritional benefits are not sufficient to shift people's choices toward entomophagy.
- Revulsion toward entomophagy felt by most Westerners can be explained as acquired distaste.
- Sensorially-driven strategies such as changes of name and visual presentation can change people's expectations.

A number of health and agricultural organizations have been encouraging Westerners to integrate insects into their diet, without success. Appealing to consumer's reason and responsibility, as they do, is likely to reinforce a dilemma in the mind of consumers: many know that they can, in principle, eat insects, and perhaps that they should eat some, but very few are willing to eat them. Here we argue that current strategies are on the wrong track in identifying the key obstacle to overcome as a question of the negative representation of insects. Decades of laboratory research, as well as years of experience in gastronomy, suggest that people's food choices are relatively immune to rational changes of representation, and instead tend to be driven by taste preferences and exposure. Here we suggest an alternative sensorially-driven strategy, which stands a much greater chance of making people eat insects on a regular basis. The turn - or better said return - to entomophagy in this sense, needs to be driven by a psychologically realistic motivation and gastronomic interest.