Hedonic Escalation: When Food Just Tastes Better and Better

Abstract

Hedonic escalation is the increased liking of each additional bite of a palatable food. Hedonic escalation is more likely to occur when (1) a palatable food consists of a complex combination of flavors, and (2) a person is motivated to taste additional flavors on each successive bite. Consequently, hedonic escalation is more prevalent when people can identify more flavors (pilot study), attend to additional flavors on each taste trial (study 1), have an opportunity to identify an additional flavor on each taste trial (study 2), and isolate distinct flavors on each taste trial (study 3). Changes in hedonic escalation can be attributed to increased sensitization to flavors as opposed to changes in the rate of habituation (study 4). Hedonic escalation can also increase consumption (study 5) and influence food choices (study 6). Collectively, these studies show that hedonic escalation is enabled by the opportunity to identify an additional source of hedonic experience on each successive taste of a food.

Pairing flavours and the temporal order of tasting

“…encourage the dinner into experiencing the elements in the dish in a certain sequence. 9 In fact, the layering and orientation of various foods can also be seen as highlighting the contrast between what pleases the eye and what might be expected to please the palate. Layering has also become interesting to the food industry as a way of asymmetrically distributing certain ingredients (e.g.…”

“…Furthermore, the sequential delivery of tasting experiences also offers the opportunity for hedonic escalation (see [9]). This is the name given to the increased liking of each additional bite of a palatable food.…”

“…Thus, given the limited ability of diners to attend selectively to the elements in a simultaneously experienced flavour (due to gestalt grouping and exogenous attentional capture by the mouth), and given the existence of the phenomenon of hedonic escalation [9], especially amongst many contemporary diners, the question in which order will tasting experiences deliver maximum palatability/pleasure becomes more important than ever. That said, the mystery still remains as to the conditions under which all components of a flavour experience will bind together into a multisensory gestalt, and when they remain distinctive, as in the dishes served by Denis Martin and Heston Blumenthal that we started with.…”

“…This they call the "ice-cream effect." There is probably also a link to the recently introduced notion of "hedonic escalation" [9]. This term describes the increased liking of each additional bite of a palatable food that contains multiple identifiable flavours that are revealed successively (we return to a fuller discussion of the notion of hedonic escalation later).…”

“…It is important to note that this situation might be in some sense special, given the diner's likely mindset in such a venue to want to search out different flavour experiences with each consecutive mouthful (see [9]). More generally, one might ask how important it is to get the timing and sequence of flavour sensations within a dish "right" during more regular everyday consumption episodes.…”