A A Study on Buyers Perception Towards Food Supplements in Sivaganga District

Abstract

Food supplements are highly helpful in meeting the daily needs of important nutrients that are not present in a regular and normal diet. They are also useful for maintaining body functions, increasing energy, and minimizing the risk of occurrence of chronic diseases.  This study was conducted among food supplement buyers in the Sivaganga district. A descriptive research design was employed. The convenience sampling method was adopted to select 250 buyers of food supplements, and data were gathered from them using a questionnaire during October–December 2025. Percentages, means and standard deviations, t-tests, ANOVA, and correlation analysis were used to study the objectives and test the hypotheses of the study. The findings reveal that buyers of food supplements perceive that food supplements are necessary to maintain better health, are highly safe, superior in quality, have natural ingredients, fill gaps in the daily diet, increase energy, and prevent the occurrence of infections. Significant differences were observed in buyers’ perception of food supplements and their profile, namely gender, age, education, monthly income, and marital status, as t(4.134 and 4.175 for gender and marital status, respectively) and F values (5.212, 7.876, and 6.560 for age, education, and monthly income, respectively) are significant at the 1% level. Moreover, buyers’ perception of food supplements has a significant, positive, and moderate relationship with their satisfaction with them, with a correlation coefficient of 0.53. Hence, food supplements should act as an alternative to medicines, must not create any side effects, and should also enhance the physical appearance of buyers. Future research may investigate the effectiveness of the dimensions of the attitude of buyers of food supplements on their buying behavior and the factors influencing  the buying behavior of buyers towards food supplements  in Sivaganga district and other districts in Tamil Nadu and the state as a whole.