Abstract
This study was conducted to understand the influences of various factors within hospital foodservice on patients’ preferences and consumption of food in Malaysian public hospitals. In study one, five groups of individuals were interviewed (total=38 respondents; 18 patients and 20 staff) in six public hospitals. Semi-structured interviews were conducted, and data were analysed using content analysis to identify factors associated with food consumption. Findings showed a failure of hospital authorities to identify factors that contributed towards patients’ conceptualisation of hospital food. As a result, this resulted in reports of poor acceptance of hospital food. Five themes were identified - food attributes, familiarity of food, feeling cared for by staff, rights to choose and eating environment, where the influence of emotion was most evident even though the relationship between emotion and hospital food consumption is not well-established in the literature. Subsequently, study two was conducted to explore the role of emotions among twenty nine patients (aged 18-65 years old) from three hospitals. Again the semi-structured interviews were used, but with the incorporation of the Critical Incident Technique (CIT). The CIT and content analysis allowed identification of 180 incidents, which indicated higher frequency of incidents eliciting negative emotion (n=108, 56.7%), than positive emotions (n=78, 43.3%). The findings highlighted the themes of emotions, arising from factors in study one and the impact on patients’ food consumption. Frequently mentioned emotions included ‘frustration’, ‘interest’, ‘enjoyment’, ‘hostility’, ‘shame’, ‘boredom’, ‘sadness’, ‘anger’, ‘surprise’ and ‘satisfaction’. Chi-square analysis indicated an association between the incidents that elicited positive or negative emotions and food provision factors (from study one). The findings of this study provide an understanding of the role of emotions and established emotion as a powerful intermediating factor on patients’ food consumption. The elicitation of positive emotions led to positive outcomes (better acceptance of hospital food, increased consumption of hospital food), and negative emotions let to negative outcomes (decreased or do not consume hospital food, increased consumption of food from outside). As such, incorporation of the emotional dimension will be useful in hospital food provision.