Consumer perceptions raised by the food safety inspection report: Does the smiley communicate a food safety risk?

The publication of inspection grades at food establishments has been introduced as a way to inform consumers about restaurants' food safety levels. This two-part study explored consumers' perceptions and behavioural intentions raised by the Finnish food safety inspection report Oiva. The first part of the study explored university students' (n = 98) spontaneous perceptions raised by the inspection grade, communicated with a smiley face. Perceptions related to food safety risk and one's own behaviour were most frequent. In the second part, these perceptions were used in testing the full food safety inspection report on a nationally representative sample of the 18–65 years old Finnish population (n = 1513) with a survey-experiment approach. Binary logistic and linear regressions revealed that lower inspection grades were directly associated with increased perceived food safety risk and a behavioural intention not to eat at the restaurant when the effect of perceived food safety risk was taken into account. Information about the risk type moderated the effect of lower inspection grades on perceived risk and behavioural intention. These results underline the importance of providing additional information to consumers about the type of food safety risk. •Consumer perceptions raised by smiley were related to food safety risk and own behaviour.•Low inspection grades increased perceived food safety risk.•Low inspection grades decreased consumer propensity to eat at the restaurant.•Consumer perceived risk partly mediated the effect of inspection grade on behaviour.•Information about risk type moderated the effect of the inspection grade.