Food shopping and preparation: Psychographic differences of working wives and housewives

A research study explored the differences in psychographic attributes shown by 246 working wives relative to 181 housewives regarding food shopping and meal preparation. The study employed a mailed 30-item questionnaire, developed from information obtained in group interviews with housewives. The subjects responded to a 6-point scale, ranging from "strongly disagree" to "stongly agree", with no neutral point. The results indicated that working wives dislike food shopping and meal preparation worse than housewives, presumably because of time constraints. Working wives also were found to care less about the effect of their food shopping and meal preparation than were housewives. The survey questionnaire and results are summarized and discussed. (wz)