fpls-12-657133 June 28, 2021 Time: 14:56 # 1 ORIGINAL RESEARCH published: 02 July 2021 doi: 10.3389/fpls.2021.657133 All Plant Breeding Technologies Are Equal, but Some Are More Equal Than Others: The Case of GM and Mutagenesis Luisa Batalha1*, Francesco Foroni1† and Brian Joseph Jones2† 1 School of Behavioural and Health Sciences, Australian Catholic University, Sydney, NSW, Australia, 2 School of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia A pervasive opposition to genetically modified (GM) foods has developed from the notion that they pose a risk to human and environmental health. Other techniques for the genetic modification of plants, such as sexual crossing and mutagenesis Edited by: breeding, have mostly remained unchallenged. This research aims to investigate public Goetz Hensel, Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf, perception of plant breeding technologies. Specifically, sexual crossing, mutagenesis, Germany transgenics (GM) and gene editing. It was expected that attitudes and intentions would Reviewed by: be most positive and the perception of risk lowest for plant genetic modification Gijs A. Kleter, Wageningen University and Research, through sexual crosses. Scores on these variables were expected to be similar Netherlands between mutagenesis, GM and gene editing. It was also expected that attitudes, Jeff Wolt, intentions and risk perception would change (becoming more positive) once participants Iowa State University, United States Stuart Smyth, learned about foods developed through these technologies. Participants reported their University of Saskatchewan, Canada attitudes, intentions and risk perception at two points in time. At Time 2, they were *Correspondence: presented with pictures of food items developed through sexual crossing, GM and Luisa Batalha
[email protected] mutagenesis.