Assessment Models of Food Health Claims and their Impact on Public Understanding and Appropriation of Science
Keywords:
health claims, assessment of benefits, scientific communication, public scientific understanding, social participationAbstract
In most countries, the authorization for the use of health claims —i.e., the statement that a specific type of food contributes to the improvement of human health— requires having passed an assessment process regarding both its beneficial properties as well as how it will be labeled in the future. These processes try to guarantee the truthfulness of the statement, in addition to its correct understanding by the consumer. This paper presents the results of a comparative analysis of the regulations for both issues in the United States and the European Union, based on categories that derive from social science studies (or STS studies), and analyzes how the different assessment strategies used to justify the health claims lead to the different ways in which the science involved is communicated. The available data regarding the effective compliance of the political objectives associated with these regulations is also shown. This analysis presents the consumer’s limitations in absorbing scientific information, precisely in the case that, a priori, would be considered less technocratic and more participative from an STS perspective.Downloads
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