Most People Would Give Lab-Grown Meat a Try, New Survey Reveals (sciencealert.com)

Clive Phillips and Matti Wilks report via ScienceAlert: In a recent survey, published this month in PLOS One, we investigated the views of people in the United States, a country with one of the largest appetites for meat and an equally large appetite for adopting new technologies. A total of 673 people responded to the survey, done online via Amazon Mechanical Turk, in which they were given information about in vitro meat (IVM) and asked questions about their attitudes to it. Although most people (65 percent), and particularly males, were willing to try IVM, only about a third said they would use it regularly or as a replacement for farmed meat. But many people were undecided: 26 percent were unsure if they would use it as a replacement for farmed meat and 31 percent unsure if they would eat it regularly. This suggests there is scope to persuade consumers that they should convert to IVM if a suitable product is available. As an indication of this potential, 53 percent said it was seen as preferable to soy substitutes. The biggest concerns were about IVM's taste and lack of appeal, particularly in the case of meats seen as healthy, such as fish and chicken, where only two-thirds of people that normally ate them said that they would if it was produced by in vitro methods. By contrast, 72 percent of people who normally eat beef and pig products would still do so if they were produced as IVM.

Comments

Re:all comes down to taste.

[dbIII]

Personally I think attempting to substitute vegetarian things for specific meat items is a mistake that will usually result in disappointment. Instead of attempting vegetarian hot dogs I think it's better to just have a vegetarian curry that does not pretend to be anything other than what it is if meat cannot be on the menu. Chunks of tofu disappoint is they are pretending to be chicken, but if they are fried and coated with sweet chilli they are something most people will like (while not resembling meat in any way).
As for vat grown meat, I agree, so long as it tastes good, but it may have to be served differently just like there's some things very lean meat doesn't work in and others that very fatty meat doesn't work in. For example Kangaroo is not something that can just be cooked up like a beef steak and taste good, it's far too lean, it's better in something like a Rendang curry. Muscle is very complicated so don't expect something like beef or pork.
An interesting thing is how the vegetarian community have embraced quorn, a highly processed food made from vat grown fungus (crumbed and fried it's nice, but once again treating it like meat is likely to dissappoint). I don't know how many vegetarians avoid meat due to dislike of farm practices but those people are likely to be early adopters of vat grown meat.

have their taste buds in their arse as far as I am concerned

When it comes down to it familiar, convenient and bland is what most people eat IMHO, myself included from time to time. If you are going to use totally different ingredients I think trying to get them to taste like something else is a mistake but I'm just a guy who likes some vegetarian food every now and again instead of someone who lives off the stuff. Maybe someone who is a full vegetarian who craves meat gets some joy out of tasteless soy chunks in an imitation of a beef stew, but I'd rather have a minestrone (or something else devised without even thinking of meat) if meat is not on the menu.

Re:Not true I bet.

[hey!]

The relevant issue here isn't age, it's one of the "big five" personality traits: openness to new experiences.

Contrary to intuition, openness to new experience remains fairly consistent over a person's lifespan, only gradually declining starting in your 60s. The reason for this discrepancy is that when you are young, new experiences are mandatory. If you are a young person low on the seeking novelty scale you still have to go out and find your first job. But if you're the kind of young person who would eat a mealworm the docent at the insect museum offers you just to see what it's like, you'll still be doing stuff like that in your 60s.