Taste hedonics and thresholds in obesity

Previous investigations of the relation of taste to obesity have focused on sweet taste, with inconclusive results. This study compared adult-onset obese, juvenile-onset obese, and never-obese females on sensitivity and hedonic (preference) responses to sweet, salty, sour, and bitter solutions. On no taste did the groups differ on detection or recognition thresholds or on hedonic ratings of supra-threshold concentrations. Two patterns of individual hedonic responses to increasing concentrations were identified with supra-threshold sucrose solutions, as in previous work, but not with the other solutions. There were no reliable relations across tastes on detection or recognition thresholds or supra-threshold hedonic ratings. Hedonic ratings of the lowest (below detection threshold) concentrations of each taste solution were examined as indices of cognitive and affective responses to the expected properties of the taste. Adult-onset obese subjects assigned higher expectancy hedonic ratings for sour and sweet than did juvenile-onset obese or never-obese subjects. The same trend held, nonsignificantly, for salty. Discussion focuses on the nature of expectancy ratings and implications of findings for future investigations of the role of taste in obesity within different obese populations.