Associate Professor Lawrence Garber Jr. was recently interviewed by The Atlantic on how color and other visual cues affect people’s attraction to food.
The article, “Food color trumps flavor,” refers to research Garber conducted showing that “when it comes to our experience of food, color is more important than product labeling and even taste.”
Garber’s research findings appear in the paper “The Effects of Food Color on Perceived Flavor,” which he coauthored with Eva Hyatt, Appalachian State University, and Richard Starr Jr., University of Auckland.
The paper’s intro reads:
This research investigates the role that food color plays in conferring identity, meaning and liking to those foods and beverages that assume many flavor varieties. In a taste test experiment manipulating food color and label information, 389 undergraduates at a public university (53% male and 47% female; 79% between 18 and 21 years of age) were assigned the task of evaluating a successful brand of powdered fruit drink. Results from this study indicate that food color affects the consumer’s ability to correctly identify flavor, to form distinct flavor profiles and preferences, and dominates other flavor information sources, including labeling and taste. Strategic alternatives for the effective deployment of food color for promotional purposes at the point of purchase are recommended.