Somatosensory factors in taste perception: Effects of active tasting and solution temperature

Touch and temperature are recognized as important factors in food perception, but much remains to be learned about how they contribute to the perception of flavor. The present paper describes human psychophysical studies that investigated two recently discovered effects of temperature and mechanical stimulation on taste: (1) enhancement of the savory taste of MSG by active tongue and mouth movements, and (2) modulation of the rate of adaptation to sucrose sweetness by temperature. The first study provides evidence that for MSG but not other taste stimuli, movement of the tongue against the palate enhances taste intensity both by increasing spatial summation between opposing gustatory surfaces and by a hypothesized interaction with touch/kinesthesis. The second study shows that the rate of adaptation to sucrose sweetness (but not quinine bitterness) on the tongue tip is strongly influenced by temperature. It is hypothesized that warming slows adaptation to sucrose by increasing the sensitivity of an early stage of taste transduction. Together these results demonstrate that models of flavor perception must include somatosensory stimuli both as components of flavor perception and as modulators of taste.

► A brief overview of somatosensory–taste interactions is presented. ► It is shown that “active tasting” selectively enhances the savory taste of MSG. ► Spatial summation was also found to be significant only for MSG savory taste. ► Adaptation to the sweet taste of sucrose is shown to be temperature-dependent.