CONSUMES PREFERENCES IN PURCHASE OF MEAT 17 
The preference for fish was most marked in New Orleans, in Wash- 
ington, and in Baltimore. The preference for fish was least marked in 
Lincoln, where not one housewife stated that her household preferred 
fish when meat was not served for dinner. In Birmingham only 
9.2 per cent of the housewives said that fish was preferred in their 
households when meat was not served. 
Question 11. — Why do you use other foods instead of meat? (Table 17.) 
One and frequently two answers were given to this question. In 
compiling the results all answers have been combined. This proce- 
dure accounted for the 4,222 replies of the American white group, 
which was larger than the total of 2,912 questionnaires shown in 
Table 2. In answer to the question, 36.1 per cent of the 4,222 
replies were variety, 22.1 per cent were palat ability, 11.3 per cent 
related to food value, 10.8 per cent to health, 6.5 per cent to econ- 
omy, 4.9 per cent to religious reasons, and the remaining 8.3 per cent 
of the replies were divided among the following reasons: Convenience 
of preparation, dislike of too much meat, balanced diet, custom and 
habit, and children's health. 
Economy was the reason which showed the greatest variation with 
differences in class in the American white group. In the poor class, 
economy constituted 15.5 per cent of the total number of replies. In 
the middle class, the corresponding figure was 6.6 per cent. In the 
well-to-do class, it was 2.5 per cent, and in the wealthy class the 
reason was given by only 0.5 per cent of the total number of house- 
wives replying. 
In the foreign groups as in the American white group, the princi- 
pal reasons assigned for the use of other foods instead of meat were 
variety and palatability. Eeligion and economy as reasons were 
more frequent among the foreign groups than in either the American 
white or colored groups. Price was indicated as an important factor 
in the choice of food in the Finnish, Polish, Italian, English, and 
German groups. Keligious reasons were important in the Polish, 
Russian, Italian, German, and English groups, and health reasons in 
the Jewish group. 
Question 12. — (a) Type of market patronized? (Tables 18 and 19.) 
The individual or unit combination meat and grocery store was 
the type most frequently patronized by housewives of the American 
white group. Of the total number replying, more than half stated 
that they patronized this type of meat market. Next in order of 
importance were the individual or unit straight meat market, stalls 
in public markets, chain stores of the combination meat and grocery 
type, and chain stores of the straight meat-market type. The house- 
wives patronizing wholesale markets, department store meat markets, 
farmers' markets, and cooperative or commissary markets were very 
small in number, when expressed as percentages of the total number 
of 2,692 housewives answering the question. 
There was a rather pronounced tendency for housewives of the poor 
class to patronize the unit combination market, 57.2 per cent of 
housewives of this class replying that they did so, while 52.6 per cent 
of the middle class, 50.4 per cent of the well-to-do class, and 45.6 
per cent of the wealthy class of housewives traded at the unit com- 
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