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The effect of meal, social interaction, environment and choice on test sensitivity between flavor variations of three meal components |
S. C. King1, A. J. Weber1, H. L. Meiselman2, and N. LV3. (1) Corporate Sensory Science Group, McCormick & Co., Inc., 204 Wight Ave., Hunt Valley, MD 21031, (2) U.S. Army Natick Soldier Center, U.S. Army Research, Development & Engineering Command, Behavior & Performance, Kansas St., Natick, MA 01760-5020, (3) Dept. of Food Science, Pennsylvania State Univ., 111 Borland Lab., University Park, PA 16802-2504 Consumer acceptance of food and beverages can be influenced by four key factors or ‘context effects’: its function as a meal component, social interaction during consumption, the environment in which it is selected and consumed and food choice freedom. We hypothesized that differences in acceptability between products would decline with the addition of context factors or variables. The goals of our project are to better predict consumer acceptance out of the laboratory and to test the above hypothesis. Five central location tests (CLTs) were conducted at the McCormick Sensory Science Center in Hunt Valley, MD where one of two flavor variations of salad, pizza and iced tea were served to respondents. Test 1 was a “traditional” CLT, test 2 presented products as part of a meal, test 3 encouraged socialization among respondents, test 4 took place in a ‘mock restaurant’ environment, and test 5 allowed respondents to choose between products. A sixth test, which served as a comparison to ‘real life’, took place at a local restaurant. In tests 1-5, context effects were additive so that by test 5, all context effects were present. Statistically significant differences existed between flavor variations of some of the meal components. These differences as well as the directions of the differences varied by test. In the case of pizza, sun dried tomato pizza scored higher than Pizza Romano in tests 2, 3 but lower in test 5. Tests 1 and 4 did not show any significant differences, which more closely resembles test 6 (“real life”). The results suggest that the addition of context may or may not reduce the test’s ability to discriminate between samples. Additional work is needed to determine if patterns are product or category specific.
Session 12, Sensory Evaluation: Methods and consumer testing
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