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At Issue
Since their market introduction in 1996, GM crops that confer insect or herbicide resistance have been adopted extensively by U.S. farmers. More recently, DNA technologies that produce plant-made pharmaceuticals are being developed for future release. The market penetration of any of these products depends on consumer acceptance, but recent research indicates mixed opinions of GM foods by U.S. consumers.
A critical issue surrounding consumer acceptance of GM foods is that current applications of agricultural biotechnology appear to offer limited benefits to consumers, while at the same time exposing society to (potential or perceived) risks. National opinion polls indicate that consumers respond positively to benefits that affect them directly, but assessing consumer acceptance of biotechnology-derived products that confer personal benefits considers only one component of consumer perceptions. Applications of agricultural biotechnology are likely to have broader societal benefits that are weighted against social costs. However, little or no evidence exists regarding the level of U.S. consumers’ support for developing recombinant DNA technologies when benefits are couched in the form of larger societal gains.
Method
 Computer-assisted telephone interviews were conducted from May to August, 2003. One form of the survey discussed GM rice; another form described a pharmaceutical application of transgenic tobacco. Respondents were randomly assigned to one survey form.
A nationally representative sample of telephone numbers was computer generated for the contiguous states within the United States. Only adults within households were interviewed, with interview length averaging nine minutes. The overall survey response rate was 41.1 percent, with 684 rice interviews and 672 tobacco surveys completed during data collection. Within each version of the survey the sampling error is + 4.1 percent.
To assess willingness to trade off concerns for social benefits, respondents were presented a brief description of the tobacco or rice technology and their potential societal benefit -- the number of human lives that could be saved worldwide if the technology were implemented. Subjects were then asked to make a choice indicating whether or not they support developing the stated technology. Levels of societal benefit were randomized across subjects in a 50-cell design, and ranged from a single life, to one million lives saved.
Respondents were also asked if they would be willing to purchase a GM product if it were sold at the same price as an equivalent non-GM product. A follow-up item offered the GM product at a discount to those respondents who would not purchase the GM product at full price. Respondents were randomly assigned to one of the following discount percentages: 5%, 10%, 25%, 40%, and 50%. Supplemental survey data were collected from respondents including basic demographics, awareness of GM technologies, and indicators of social concerns.
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