Individual Differences in Sweetness Ratings and Cross-Modal Aroma-Taste Interactions

Abstract

Aroma-taste interactions, which are believed to occur due to previous coexposure (concurrent presence of aroma and taste), have been suggested as a strategy to aid sugar reduction in food and beverages. However, coexposures might be influenced by individual differences. We therefore hypothesized that aroma-taste interactions vary across individuals. The present study investigated how individual differences (gender, age, and sweet liker status) influenced the effect of aroma on sweetness intensity among young adults. An initial screening of five aromas, all congruent with sweet taste, for their sweetness enhancing effect was carried out using descriptive analysis. Among the aromas tested, vanilla was found most promising for its sweet enhancing effects and was therefore tested across three sucrose concentrations by 129 young adults. Among the subjects tested, females were found to be more susceptible to the sweetness enhancing effect of vanilla aroma than males. For males, the addition of vanilla aroma increased the sweet taste ratings significantly for the 22–25-year-olds, but not the 19–21-year-olds. Consumers were clustered according to their sweet liker status based on their liking for the samples. Although sweet taste ratings were found to vary with the sweet liker status, aroma enhanced the sweetness ratings similarly across clusters. These results call for more targeted product development in order to aid sugar reduction.

Ternary Cross-Modal Interactions between Sweetness, Aroma, and Viscosity in Different Beverage Matrices

“…The vanilla aroma was in both matrices found to enhance sweet taste with increasing vanilla aroma concentrations (Tables 3 and 4), at least up to 1 mL/kg which was the maximum concentration tested in this study. As mentioned, this is in accordance with an abundance of previous literature demonstrating that addition of vanilla aroma increased sweet taste perception [6,7,16,17,[35][36][37][38][39]. However, in terms of vanilla concentration, few authors have studied the effect of vanilla aroma concentration on sweet taste intensity.…”

“…In terms of the effect of vanilla aroma in relation to the concentration of sucrose, the addition of vanilla aroma only significantly increased the sweet taste intensity at the low sucrose concentration in the aqueous matrix ( Figure 3A). The fact that the cross-modal effect of aroma on sweet taste intensity is more pronounced at lower sucrose concentrations is also in accordance with previous literature [17,19,20,39,46]. However, this is not in accordance with the results from the apple nectar matrix, where the addition of vanilla aroma increased sweet taste intensity independently of the sucrose concentration ( Figure 3B).…”

“…Lethuaut et al [34] commented that it could be due to the low level of congruency between the fruity aroma and the sweet taste in the dairy desserts investigated, that they did not observe any effects of aroma on sweet taste intensity. For the present study, we consequently chose an aroma that has previously been demonstrated to increase sweet taste multiple times in various matrices, namely vanilla aroma [6,7,16,17,[35][36][37][38][39]. Even though vanilla has been found to increase sweet taste in different matrices, other studies have shown that the type of matrix may have big effects on sensory interactions [6,40].…”

Current Trends in Multidisciplinary Approaches to Understanding Consumer Preference and Acceptance of Food Products

“…However, co-exposures might be influenced by individual differences. The authors therefore hypothesized that aroma–taste interactions vary across individuals [ 10 ]. Moreover, Bertelsen et al (2020) investigated how individual differences (gender, age, and sweet liker status) influenced the effect of aroma on sweetness intensity among young adults.…”

“…Thus, in this Special Issue collection “Consumer Preferences and Acceptance of Food Products” we bring together articles which encompass the wide scope of multidisciplinary research and perspectives in the space related to the determination of key factors involved. The articles included can be considered to cover stakeholders in the perception chain, from ‘the Senses’ regarding fundamental interactions [ 10 , 11 , 12 ], on to ‘Physiological responses’ [ 13 , 14 ], ‘Food choice’ itself, [ 15 , 16 ] and on to studies looking at ‘Purchasing decision processes’ [ 17 , 18 ], and finally to key factors in relation to behaviors in the ‘Market itself’ [ 19 ]. Moreover, we include an in-depth review of extrinsic vs. intrinsic factors themselves in a sweetness in beverage context which brings a unique perspective to beverage design for the future [ 1 ].…”