Rob Richerson
Rob Richerson is co-author, with James A. Mead, of the 2018 Journal of Business Research paper on package colour saturation and perceived food healthfulness. The paper found that vivid, highly saturated packaging was rated less healthful than muted packaging across four experiments.
Who they are
Richerson is listed as the second author of the paper named below. Beyond this paper, this page holds no biographical detail, and none is guessed. His affiliation was not confirmed.
Key papers
Mead, J. A., & Richerson, R. (2018). Package color saturation and food healthfulness perceptions. Journal of Business Research, 82, 10-18. doi:10.1016/j.jbusres.2017.08.015.
Key ideas
The abstract names the moderators. Conceptual fluency mediates the effect, subjective nutrition knowledge weakens it and restrained eating strengthens it. The authors position the paper as extending colour research on how distinct colour elements affect consumer perceptions, adding a heuristic to the food well-being literature and offering food marketers insight into how consumers evaluate their products.
The paper tested saturation, and not hue, so it does not say whether green in particular helps or hurts a health rating. The same holds for the opposite finding of Kunz and colleagues (2020) on drinks. The 2023 Steiner and Florack review cites both and lists the conflict among its unresolved findings. See Colour as a Health Cue, Lightness and Saturation Confound and Does Green Packaging Look Healthier.
Sources
- Mead, J. A., & Richerson, R. (2018). Package color saturation and food healthfulness perceptions. Journal of Business Research, 82, 10-18. doi:10.1016/j.jbusres.2017.08.015. Abstract level, from a bibliographic record.