Department of Agribusiness & Consumer Science, College of Agriculture & Food Science, King Faisal University, Al-Ahsa, Saudi Arabia.
Department of Quantitative Methods, Business School, King Faisal University, Al-Ahsa, Saudi Arabia.
PLoS One. 2023 Aug 3;18(8):e0289512. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0289512. eCollection 2023.
This study examines the attributes of date palm fruits that influence consumer purchasing decisions and measures the attributes' relative importance weights for understanding consumption patterns relative to the cultivation areas. A case study was conducted for a selected date fruit, Khalas, which is cultivated in Saudi Arabia and ranked first in the world in exported dates. Our empirical investigation is based on utilizing a proposed quantitative analysis that integrated the entropy weighting method and binary logit models. With this survey design, 486 questionnaires were collected. Analysis results revealed a ranking list of preferred attributes, with size, mellowness, price, and color being the most valued. However, this ranking list fluctuates when different cultivated types of Khalas dates are available. The results also showed that consumption patterns may change in terms of preference index and shopping location. The paper concludes with a discussion of managerial implications, limitations, and future research directions.
本研究考察了影响消费者购买决策的椰枣果实属性，并衡量了这些属性的相对重要性权重，以了解相对于种植地区的消费模式。选择了一种名为 Khalas 的椰枣进行案例研究，这种椰枣在沙特阿拉伯种植，在出口椰枣中排名世界第一。我们的实证调查是基于利用一种提出的定量分析方法，该方法集成了熵权法和二元逻辑回归模型。采用这种调查设计，共收集了 486 份问卷。分析结果显示了首选属性的排名列表，其中大小、甜度、价格和颜色是最有价值的属性。然而，当 Khalas 椰枣的不同种植类型可用时，这个排名列表会发生波动。结果还表明，消费模式可能会根据偏好指数和购物地点发生变化。本文最后讨论了管理意义、局限性和未来的研究方向。
