Influence of colour on food and drinks selection of elementary school students

Colour is one of the most influential stimulus in human life. It is one of the most important factors in choosing of food, because it tells us about the taste and quality of food. People are attracted to colorful and vibrant colours, because they tell us that the observed foods or drinks have better quality and have a more profound flavour. Items with colorful and strong colours catch our attention and are more likely to get picked out. The purpose of this master thesis is to discover how colours in food and drinks affect students' decision making and which colours have the greatest influence on their decision making. The purpose of this thesis is also to study the importance of natural colour in choosing of foods and drink and how do students connect flavour and smell with specific colours. The sample of the research consisted of 205 students, aged between 11 to 15 from different parts of Slovenia. The students in the sample were given a questionnaire, which asked various questions related to their understanding of colour and how much do the colours affect their choice of food. Based on the results of the analysis it is possible to give the following conclusions: (1) according to students, the most important factor for choosing food is taste and the least important factor is colour, (2) students prefered colourful food to dull coloured food, (3) there are no significant differences in choice of food based on its colour between the genders, (4) there are no significant differences in students personal correlation between various colours and tastes among the age groups and (5) students perceive »smell« of colours like yellow, white, orange and pink as pleasant, but colours like black and brown as unpleasant. From the conclusions it is possible to conclude that there is an importance of colour when it comes to food choices in students