The impact of calorie and physical activity labelling on consumer's emo-sensory perceptions and food choices.

Providing labelling information is one of the strategies used to help consumers make healthier choices. However, although the type of information has the potential to assist consumers, it is important to evaluate their sensory and emotional perceptions. Therefore, the objective of this study was to evaluate the effect of different labelling information on consumers' sensory and emotional perceptions and their choices, for three different products (potato chips, juice and yogurt). A total of 480 participants were randomly assigned to one of four information conditions (no information (blind), kilocalorie (kcal) information, physical activity (PA) information [duration of walking required to burn the kcal in the product], kcal + PA information). For each information condition, participants were provided with higher kcal and lower kcal equivalent food pairs and were required to choose one. The participants evaluated their overall liking using a 9-point hedonic scale and answered rate-all-that-apply (RATA) questions related to the sensory and emotional characteristics of the products. The results showed no significant impact of calorie and physical activity labelling on consumers' overall liking for juice and yogurt samples and no impact of PA information for chips. Significant differences in overall liking were found when comparing the blind condition with kcal and kcal + PA information, with lower acceptance of the chips samples when this information was presented. Although providing calorie and physical activity labelling had little impact on consumers' sensory and emotional perceptions, consumers perceived unhealthy attributes and negative emotions, such as fatty and guilty, when information was presented. The present work suggests that, although nutrition labelling may be presented as an important strategy to assist consumers, it is important to evaluate consumers' lifestyles, considering that non-dieters and those low and moderate in dietary restraint may not be impacted by this information.

A comparison of two low-calorie sweeteners and sugar in dark chocolate on sensory attributes and emotional conceptualisations.

Reducing sugar consumption is an important aspect in the prevention of and fight against obesity. A broader understanding of consumers' perceptions of low-calorie sweeteners is needed. This study examined two low-calorie sweeteners, tagatose and stevia, in comparison to sugar in dark chocolate. A total of 219 consumers participated in this study and rated overall liking and sensory attributes. Participants also listed their emotional conceptualisations upon consumption and were assessed on emotional eating behaviour and health and taste attitudes. The chocolate with tagatose was perceived as more similar to the chocolate with sugar than with stevia on overall liking, texture, bitterness, duration of aftertaste and intensity of aftertaste. Furthermore, chocolate with sugar and chocolate with tagatose both elicited positive emotional conceptualisations whereas chocolate with stevia elicited negative emotional conceptualisations. In conclusion, dark chocolate with tagatose did not significantly differ from sugar in overall liking, most sensory attributes and emotional conceptualisation.

Impact of Health Labels on Flavor Perception and Emotional Profiling: A Consumer Study on Cheese.

The global increase of cardiovascular diseases is linked to the shift towards unbalanced diets with increasing salt and fat intake. This has led to a growing consumers' interest in more balanced food products, which explains the growing number of health-related claims on food products (e.g., "low in salt" or "light"). Based on a within-subjects design, consumers (n = 129) evaluated the same cheese product with different labels. Participants rated liking, saltiness and fat flavor intensity before and after consuming four labeled cheeses. Even though the cheese products were identical, inclusion of health labels influenced consumer perceptions. Cheese with a "light" label had a lower overall expected and perceived liking compared to regular cheese. Although cheese with a "salt reduced" label had a lower expected liking compared to regular cheese, no lower liking was found when consumers actually consumed the labeled cheese. All labels also influenced the perceived intensities of the attributes related to these labels, e.g., for example salt intensity for reduced salt label. While emotional profiles of the labeled cheeses differed before tasting, little differences were found when actual tasting these cheeses. In conclusion, this study shows that health-related labels might influence the perceived flavor and emotional profiles of cheese products.

An integrated method for the emotional conceptualization and sensory characterization of food products: The EmoSensory® Wheel.

Although acceptability is commonly used to examine liking for food products, more studies now emphasize the importance of measuring consumers' conceptualizations, such as emotions for food products. It is also important to identify how consumers perceive the sensory attributes of food products, as illustrated by the increasing involvement of consumers in product characterization. The objective of this paper is to examine the use of a wheel-format questionnaire to obtain both an emotional and sensory profiles for food products using a hands-on consumer tool. Terms selected were product-specific and the rate-all-that-apply (RATA) approach was used as a scaling technique. Three different experiments demonstrated that the EmoSensory® Wheel could discriminate within and between food product categories. The added value of the RATA approach was illustrated in the sample discrimination for some food products when using the weighted attribute scores for analysis. The tool was used in both blind and informed conditions to illustrate its applicability across different experimental designs. In general, the respondents did not find the task tedious when using the wheel-questionnaire format, demonstrating the potential for collecting information in a more facile way. Although further studies with other food products are needed, this paper shows the potential for using this wheel format to obtain information about consumers' emotional and sensory profiling of food products.