Effects of Context and Virtual Reality Environments on the Wine Tasting Experience, Acceptability, and Emotional Responses of Consumers

Abstract

Wine tasting is a multidimensional experience that includes contextual information from tasting environments. Formal sensory tastings are limited by the use of booths that lack ecological validity and engagement. Virtual reality (VR) can overcome this limitation by simulating different environmental contexts. Perception, sensory acceptability, and emotional responses of a Cabernet Sauvignon wine under traditional sensory booths, contextual environments, and VR simulations were evaluated and compared. Participants (N = 53) performed evaluations under five conditions: (1) traditional booths, (2) bright-restaurant (real environment with bright lights), (3) dark-restaurant (real environment with dimly lit candles), (4) bright-VR (VR restaurant with bright lights), and (5) dark-VR (VR restaurant with dimly lit candles). Participants rated the acceptability of aroma, sweetness, acidity, astringency, mouthfeel, aftertaste, and overall liking (9-point hedonic scale), and intensities of sweetness, acidity, and astringency (15-point unstructured line-scale). Results showed that context (booths, real, or VR) affected the perception of the wine’s floral aroma (dark-VR = 8.6 vs. booths = 7.5). Liking of the sensory attributes did not change under different environmental conditions. Emotional responses under bright-VR were associated with “free”, “glad”, and “enthusiastic”; however, under traditional booths, they were related to “polite” and “secure”. “Nostalgic” and “daring” were associated with dark-VR. VR can be used to understand contextual effects on consumer perceptions.

Virtual Terroir and the Premium Coffee Experience

“…As Meiselman ( 2008 ) suggested, product experiences also relate to the interaction between a product and specific contexts and situations, which can influence the emotions people experience while consuming a product. More appropriate scenarios for food consumption can trigger more positive emotions (Torrico et al, 2020 ). Thus, the same product can be experienced differently depending on the context and situation.…”

Product Design to Enhance Consumer Liking of Cull Ewe Meat

“…Given that the anticipated route to market for the selected mutton dishes is restaurants and that consumers respond differently in laboratory and restaurant settings, the investigators elected to conduct the consumer panel in a “real-life” restaurant setting in order to maintain the ecological validity of this study [ 46 , 47 , 48 ]. The panel was therefore conducted as a dinner from 7 pm to 9 pm at the Angliss bistro (WAI training restaurant) located in Melbourne Victoria Australia, with the restaurant open only to panel participants.…”

Senses of place: architectural design for the multisensory mind

“…It is though worth noting that just as for the olfactory case, some atmospheric effects on tasting may be more cognitively-mediated (e.g., associated with the priming of notions of luxury/expense, or lack thereof) while others may be more direct, as when changing the colour (see Oberfeld,Hecht,11 Indeed, one might wonder whether the latter quote refers more to oral stereoagnosis (Jacobs, Serhal, & van Steenberghe, 1998), than specifically to gustation (see also Waterman Jr., 1917, for the suggestion that the tongue can be more revealing than the hand). Allendorf, & Wickelmaier, 2009;Spence, Velasco, & Knoeferle, 2014;Torrico et al, 2020) or brightness (Gal et al, 2007;Xu & LaBroo, 2014) of the ambient lighting changes taste/flavour perception.…”

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