From 21–25 July 2026, the TITAN project was presented at the 31st International Congress of Applied Psychology (ICAP 2026) in Florence, Italy. Organised by the International Association of Applied Psychology and the Associazione Italiana di Psicologia, the congress is one of the world’s largest events in applied psychology, bringing together researchers to share the latest findings on human behaviour and its applications across a wide range of fields.
As part of the Sustainable Consumption and Behaviours session, researchers from our project partner University of Warsaw presented findings from TITAN Work Package 6 through the presentation “The Connection Between Parental and Child Food Neophobia – Cross Cultural Study Among European Families”.
The study explored how parents influence children’s willingness to try new foods, with a particular focus on food neophobia across families in Spain, Finland and Poland. The research involved 720 parents of children aged 6–12 years and examined how parental behaviour, gender and cultural context shape children’s attitudes towards unfamiliar foods.
The results showed a moderate positive relationship between parental and child food neophobia, with parental food neophobia identified as the strongest predictor of children’s reluctance to try new foods. The study also found that the strength of this relationship varied across countries, highlighting the importance of cultural context in understanding food-related behaviours.
These findings contribute to TITAN’s work on supporting healthier and more sustainable eating habits by improving understanding of the social and behavioural factors that influence food choices. By exploring how attitudes towards new foods develop within families, the project is helping to generate evidence that can support future strategies promoting the acceptance of more sustainable diets.
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