{"title":"Ultra-processed foods are of poor nutritional quality in French consumers' representations; a categorization study of images of food products without information","authors":"Jessy Youssef , Stéphanie Chambaron , Laurence Dujourdy , Gaëlle Arvisenet","doi":"10.1016/j.foodqual.2025.105609","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.foodqual.2025.105609","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This study investigated how consumers categorize food according to its nutritional quality and degree of processing through two online questionnaires. Two hundred French consumers used a directed sorting task to categorize 21 images of food products by nutritional quality and degree of processing. The images contained no information about these two characteristics or any other properties. Two multinomial logit regression analyses revealed that (1) without any access to established values for degree of processing or nutritional quality, participants' categorizations of food images closely mirrored these established values; (2) participants' categorization of food products by nutritional quality was also influenced by non-nutritional properties; (3) participants linked nutritional quality to degree of processing in their categorizations. Possible reasons are proposed for this link and the cognitive mechanisms involved, such as a learned association resulting from the overly simple messages conveyed by dietary guidelines, the use of heuristics to overcome the difficulty of estimating the nutritional quality of food products in the absence of information, and the health halo effect.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":322,"journal":{"name":"Food Quality and Preference","volume":"133 ","pages":"Article 105609"},"PeriodicalIF":4.9,"publicationDate":"2025-06-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144229561","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Marion Garaus , Elisabeth Wolfsteiner , Christian Garaus
{"title":"The impact of climate claims on meat alternative adoption: The underlying mechanism of taste inferences and anticipated guilt","authors":"Marion Garaus , Elisabeth Wolfsteiner , Christian Garaus","doi":"10.1016/j.foodqual.2025.105585","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.foodqual.2025.105585","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The increasing adoption of meat alternatives can significantly contribute to animal welfare, human health, and environmental sustainability by reducing greenhouse-gas emissions from livestock production. While meat alternatives currently represent only a small fraction of the market compared to traditional meat, their growth is accelerating rapidly. Highlighting whether the product is environmentally friendly on packaging may serve as an effective strategy to accelerate its adoption. This research examines the impact of climate claims as a key influence, exploring how they shape taste inferences and anticipated guilt, ultimately driving consumers' willingness to adopt meat alternatives. An experiment employing a one-factor between-subjects design tests the theoretical model with a representative sample of Austrian consumers. Data from this sample (<em>N</em> = 427) were analyzed with MANCOVA and mediation analysis. The data confirm the theoretical reasoning that climate claims stimulate taste inferences and, at the same time, reduce feelings of anticipated guilt. Both variables impact the adoption of meat-alternative products. However, the indirect effect of taste inferences was more substantial than the indirect effect of anticipated guilt. This study is the first to show that taste inferences and anticipated guilt are underlying processes that explain how climate claims for meat alternatives impact their adoption by consumers. The findings contribute to the ongoing debate on the effectiveness of claims and provide theoretically derived explanations of why a climate claim impacts consumer responses positively in the context of a plant-based diet.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":322,"journal":{"name":"Food Quality and Preference","volume":"133 ","pages":"Article 105585"},"PeriodicalIF":4.9,"publicationDate":"2025-05-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144241350","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pupin Liu , Zhejun Xu , Mingyu Su , Jianshe Chen , Xinmiao Wang
{"title":"The role of chewing efficiency in aroma release and perception during oral processing of solid model foods","authors":"Pupin Liu , Zhejun Xu , Mingyu Su , Jianshe Chen , Xinmiao Wang","doi":"10.1016/j.foodqual.2025.105598","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.foodqual.2025.105598","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This study investigates the oral processing mechanisms underlying aroma release and perception during the chewing of solid model food particles (made from dental impression materials) in individuals with different chewing efficiency. By comparing the dynamic processes of model food particle breakdown, salivary secretion, protein concentration, and aroma release, it was found that individuals with higher chewing efficiency (‘high CE’ group) exhibited higher aroma release, with increased and longer perceived intensity. Increased chewing cycles were found to promote aroma release. However, this relationship varied between participants different chewing efficiency (‘high CE’ group vs. ‘low CE’ group), reflecting the underlying differences in their oral physiology (including model food mechanical breakdown, saliva secretion upon stimulation, and total salivary protein content during chewing). The hydrophobicity of aroma compounds (ethyl acetate vs. ethyl octanoate) undoubtedly affected both aroma release and perception during mastication. Unlike existing static headspace analysis studies, associations found from this study resulted from the multiple interplay of hydrogen bonds/hydrophobic interactions between aroma compounds and saliva proteins, mastication-induced saliva dilution effects, and the available release surface area due to chewing efficiency. Findings from this study provide novel insights into how individual differences in oral physiology and chewing efficiency—independent of the complex interactions between saliva and food matrices—impact aroma perception, and offer important implications for personalized food formulation and sensory perception optimization, particularly for populations with impaired oral processing abilities.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":322,"journal":{"name":"Food Quality and Preference","volume":"133 ","pages":"Article 105598"},"PeriodicalIF":4.9,"publicationDate":"2025-05-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144212188","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Generative AI framework for sensory and consumer research","authors":"Kosuke Motoki , Julia Low , Carlos Velasco","doi":"10.1016/j.foodqual.2025.105600","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.foodqual.2025.105600","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) technologies, including ChatGPT, offer innovative capabilities in sensory and consumer science. Recent empirical studies in sensory and consumer science highlight the potential utility of GenAI in, for example, AI-generated food images and recipes. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first paper to propose a comprehensive framework for integrating GenAI into research and development in sensory and consumer science. The framework highlights how GenAI can be applied across the concept, design, and testing phases through an iterative process. The concept phase utilises GenAI to generate research concepts (e.g., proposing ideas such as research questions and hypotheses). The design phase employs GenAI to formulate research designs. During this stage, GenAI assists with creating and validating survey/experimental stimuli and measurement scales. The testing phase applies GenAI to evaluate research ideas and designs by employing “silicon samples,” interactive surveys that enhance engagement and response quality. In the testing phase, GenAI can also analyse unstructured text data, offering more accurate and scalable text analysis than traditional methods, even across diverse languages and cultures. This study also acknowledges potential pitfalls, such as biases in AI outputs, data privacy and security concerns, oversimplification, lack of transparency, and GenAI user misperception. This article encourages greater integration of GenAI by highlighting its potential for the sensory and consumer science community, while addressing its limitations and ensuring adherence to high ethical standards.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":322,"journal":{"name":"Food Quality and Preference","volume":"133 ","pages":"Article 105600"},"PeriodicalIF":4.9,"publicationDate":"2025-05-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144223544","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Automating chemosensory creativity assessment with large language models","authors":"Qian Janice Wang , Robert Pellegrino","doi":"10.1016/j.foodqual.2025.105599","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.foodqual.2025.105599","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Chemosensory creativity, the ability to innovate using taste and smell, is a crucial yet understudied aspect of human ingenuity. This study explores the potential of large language models (LLMs), specifically GPT-4, to assess creativity in the context of flavour pairings. Leveraging a novel chemosensory creativity test inspired by the Alternative Uses Task, 200 UK-based participants generated flavour pairings across four food categories. Subsequently, these pairings were rated for creativity, deliciousness, and surprise by human participants and two GPT-4 configurations: a deterministic (low-randomness) model termed “Strict GPT” and a stochastic (high-randomness) model termed “Flexible GPT.”</div><div>Findings reveal a strong correlation between human and Flexible GPT ratings of creativity (<em>r</em> = 0.89), surpassing that of Strict GPT (<em>r</em> = 0.71). Both humans and GPT models relied heavily on novelty (operationalised as surprise) rather than functionality (operationalised by deliciousness) as a determinant of creativity. However, GPT ratings exhibited a stronger emphasis on novelty and higher variability. While GPT-4 demonstrated strong potential for approximating human assessments in the UK context, differences emerged, particularly for rare flavour pairings where human ratings and model predictions had less alignment. These findings demonstrate the feasibility of using LLMs to automate creativity assessments in food-related domains by approximating human evaluations.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":322,"journal":{"name":"Food Quality and Preference","volume":"132 ","pages":"Article 105599"},"PeriodicalIF":4.9,"publicationDate":"2025-05-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144178303","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Sarah Wangui Muiruri , Anna Birgitte Milford , Kyrre Rickertsen
{"title":"Norwegian consumption of plant-based meat analogues","authors":"Sarah Wangui Muiruri , Anna Birgitte Milford , Kyrre Rickertsen","doi":"10.1016/j.foodqual.2025.105597","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.foodqual.2025.105597","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Plant-based meat analogues (PBMA) are expected to reduce environmental, health, and animal welfare challenges from the production and consumption of meat. This paper investigates PBMA consumption using three rounds of a survey. PBMA consumption in Norway increased from 2017 to 2019 but stagnated in 2022. Several food choice motives and socioeconomic factors affected consumption consistently across the survey rounds. Emphasizing the environment, animal welfare, and novelty were positively associated with PBMA consumption, while emphasizing familiarity and Norwegian origin were negatively associated. Younger, higher educated, urban, and vegetarian respondents were more likely to consume PBMA. Use of social media had a positive effect on the consumption for the total sample, but it was not stable across the survey rounds. Producers, marketers, and other policy makers could promote the environmental and animal welfare benefits along with the novelty aspects of PBMA. The use of domestic ingredients could also appeal to older and rural individuals who emphasize food familiarity.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":322,"journal":{"name":"Food Quality and Preference","volume":"132 ","pages":"Article 105597"},"PeriodicalIF":4.9,"publicationDate":"2025-05-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144131362","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Liezl Bossaerts , Niels A. Langenaeken , Veerle Daems , Arno G.B. Wouters , Christophe M. Courtin
{"title":"Understanding the relationship between carbonation-related characteristics and sensory perception of alcoholic and non-alcoholic beers","authors":"Liezl Bossaerts , Niels A. Langenaeken , Veerle Daems , Arno G.B. Wouters , Christophe M. Courtin","doi":"10.1016/j.foodqual.2025.105596","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.foodqual.2025.105596","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The mouthfeel of non-alcoholic beers is often considered inferior to that of their alcoholic counterparts. Mouthfeel is influenced, inter alia, by carbonation-related properties such as the bubble size, sting and the amount of bubbles. This study investigated differences in the carbonation-related properties of alcoholic and non-alcoholic beers and whether such differences are sensorially perceivable. Four non-alcoholic commercial beers and their alcoholic counterparts were analysed for their CO<sub>2</sub> content on the one hand and the size and amount of bubbles formed on a nucleation line in a beer glass on the other hand. A sensory evaluation involving 20 assessors was conducted to link these carbonation-related properties to perceived mouthfeel attributes. Results show that significantly fewer bubbles formed in a glass filled with non-alcoholic than with alcoholic beer. Sensory evaluation indicated that this parameter served as a good predictor of how consumers perceived the amount of bubbles in their mouths. The bubble sizes of non-alcoholic and alcoholic beers were rather similar and no difference in bubble size between alcoholic and non-alcoholic beers could be perceived sensorially. Furthermore, no differences were observed in CO<sub>2</sub> content between the alcoholic and non-alcoholic beers and a similar sting was perceived. These findings suggest that increasing bubble formation in non-alcoholic beers could help bridge the quality gap between alcoholic and non-alcoholic beers regarding mouthfeel.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":322,"journal":{"name":"Food Quality and Preference","volume":"132 ","pages":"Article 105596"},"PeriodicalIF":4.9,"publicationDate":"2025-05-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144167998","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Sensory and emotional perception of nitrite-free and meatless cooked ham alternatives; does information matter?","authors":"Stergios Melios , Declan Bolton , Emily Crofton","doi":"10.1016/j.foodqual.2025.105595","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.foodqual.2025.105595","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The processed meat market is undergoing significant changes following the European Commission setting new reduced limits for the use of nitrites as food additives and the global shift toward meatless diets to improve human and planetary health. This study aimed to generate new consumer insights into the overall liking, sensory (CATA) and emotional (EsSense25 CATA) perception, and purchase intent of conventional, nitrite-free, and meatless cooked hams, and to understand whether the provision of health risk, health benefit, and health plus environmental benefit information can influence consumer responses to these products, respectively. Irish consumers (<em>n</em> = 120) evaluated each of the cooked hams twice without (blind) or with (informed) relevant information in a central location test. Results showed that regardless of experimental condition, the nitrite-free cooked ham was liked the most while the meatless product was liked the least. The provision of health benefit information significantly increased the overall liking and purchase intent of the nitrite-free product, while health plus environmental benefit information increased purchase intent of the meatless product. Following the provision of information, the conventional product was characterized by a significantly higher citation of “highly salty” while the meatless product had a significantly lower citation of “cooked ham flavour”. Moreover, for the nitrite-free product consumers cited significantly more “happy” and less “disgusted” emotional associations after the provision of information. The findings support innovation for the development of cooked hams that offer benefit in terms of health and the environment, driving opportunities for future consumer engagement within the processed meat industry.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":322,"journal":{"name":"Food Quality and Preference","volume":"132 ","pages":"Article 105595"},"PeriodicalIF":4.9,"publicationDate":"2025-05-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144134416","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Cynthia Loi , Alan McClure , John E. Hayes , Helene Hopfer
{"title":"Olfaction modulates taste attributes in different types of chocolate","authors":"Cynthia Loi , Alan McClure , John E. Hayes , Helene Hopfer","doi":"10.1016/j.foodqual.2025.105584","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.foodqual.2025.105584","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Bitterness is considered an unpleasant taste, while also dominating the flavor of highly liked foods like chocolate. Adding dark chocolate aroma to a cocoa beverage enhances bitterness via cross-modal interactions. Foods naturally contain volatiles that can affect taste, so the influence of endogenous aromas on chocolate bitterness was investigated here. Specifically, we explored effects of olfaction, roasting and cocoa mass content in two experiments with regular chocolate consumers rating overall liking and intensities of bitterness, sweetness, sourness, astringency, cocoa flavor, and grittiness. Nine differently roasted 100 % chocolates (Experiment 1) and three commercial chocolates varying in cocoa content (0–100 %; Experiment 2) were assessed in two session crossover designs with and without olfactory input.</div><div>In Experiment 1, we found significant interactions between roasting conditions and olfactory input for all attributes, but not overall liking. Greater olfactory enhancement of bitter and sour taste and astringency were observed for chocolates roasted at lower temperatures. We also saw a significant interaction between cocoa content and olfactory input for sour and bitter tastes, with greater odor enhancement of these tastes at a higher cocoa content. In Experiment 2, the 100 % commercial chocolate showed a smaller olfactory effect on bitterness than in Experiment 1, implying that aroma quality also affects olfactory enhancement of bitterness and sourness in chocolate. Collectively, the effect of olfaction on taste and mouthfeel perception in chocolate is complex and depends on both cocoa content in the chocolate and how the cocoa has been roasted.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":322,"journal":{"name":"Food Quality and Preference","volume":"132 ","pages":"Article 105584"},"PeriodicalIF":4.9,"publicationDate":"2025-05-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144125119","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Investigating consumer heterogeneity in multiblock L-shape data by combining SO-PLS regression and two-step procedure","authors":"Quoc Cuong Nguyen","doi":"10.1016/j.foodqual.2025.105580","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.foodqual.2025.105580","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This manuscript proposes, for the first time, a new way to analyse L-shape data by combining the Sequential and Orthogonalized – Partial Least Square (SO-PLS) regression, and the Two-step PLS based Procedure (TSP) approach in the so called Sequential and Orthogonalized – Two Step Procedure (SO-TSP) approach. In a sensory and consumer study conducted in Norway, two blocks of sensory properties data (i.e. beginning, and middle-end of eating process), one block of consumer preferences liking data, and two blocks of consumer attributes data (i.e. health, and taste) were collected. Data were analysed in two steps. In <em>step 1</em>, consumer liking data are regressed onto sensory properties at the beginning and middle-end of eating process using the SO-PLS regression. Then, consumers were then segmented according to the Principal Components of Predictions (PCP) correlation. In <em>step 2</em> consumer dummy variables, which represent two segments from step 1, are regressed onto the two consumer attributes blocks data (i.e. attitudes to taste and healthiness) using SO-PLS regression. These findings demonstrate that the SO-TSP approach is a useful and flexible tool to investigate and understand the complex relations among consumer segments, and the different blocks of dynamic sensory properties, and different types of consumer attributes data. Methodological implications and recommendations for academia, and future research avenues are discussed and outlined.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":322,"journal":{"name":"Food Quality and Preference","volume":"132 ","pages":"Article 105580"},"PeriodicalIF":4.9,"publicationDate":"2025-05-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144083862","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}