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The Sense of Smell in Food Quality and Sensory Evaluation: N - Y - State NY
The Sense of Smell in Food Quality and Sensory Evaluation: N - Y - State NY
SENSORY EVALUATION
HARRY LAWLESS
ABSTRACT
The sense of smell is the major contributing sensory system in the perception
of food aromas and volatile flavors. Illustrations of the importance of olfactory
sensations can be found in the literature on product quality defects and in the
importance of aroma andJavor characteristics in driving consumer acceptability
of foods. Assessing olfactory-mediated characteristics of flavors is challenging,
however, for a number of reasons. There are wide individual difSerences in
olfactory acuity, as suggested by the existence of spec#c anosmias. Panelists
are often strongly influenced by the immediate context in which samples are
judged. Developing a useful consensual language to describe smells in sensory
analyses can also be difjicult. In spite of these challenges, the human sense of
smell is the ultimate discriminator offood aroma andflavor quality; instrumental
analyses are a poor substitute. Even in cases in which chemical components of
food ftavors have been identzjied, these must be cross-referenced against human
sensitivities in order to estimate their sensory impact.
INTRODUCTION
This paper emphasizes the importance of the sense of smell in food quality
and sensory evaluation. The paper is divided into three main parts. The first
section discusses a general framework for thinking about food quality, and
attempts to define quality in several ways. The second section illustrates the
contributions of the sense of smell to food quality through aromas and volatile
flavors. The third section emphasizes the need to cross-reference instrumental
analysis of volatile aroma and flavor with human data on the potency or sensory
impact of those compounds and discusses some concerns in the sensory and
instrumental analysis of aroma and flavor, including the phenomenon of specific
DEFINITIONS OF QUALITY
applying standard defect grading schemes, the Journal of Dairy Science has
warned researchers that such systems may be inappropriate for basic research
purposes (Hammond et al. 1986). Yet another problem with this approach is
that two products may both be free from defects, yet differ in quality. While
defects are certainly important, consideration of only obvious negatives may
omit a great deal of important variation.
A fourth approach is to equate quality with consumer acceptance. Products
that people like and prefer are high in quality. This criterion is readily actionable
and applicable to new product development. A process or formula can be op-
timized based on consumer acceptance ratings (Williams 1988) or on maximizing
the proportion of consumers who find the product acceptable (Lagrange and
Norback 1987). This approach also avoids a limitation of defect-grading schemes
in that a range of defect-free products can be differentiated. However, it is not
without its pitfalls. Like the market-driven definitions of what makes a good
product, there are many successful products of only moderate quality that find
large followings of loyal consumers. When given sufficient exposure to higher
quality products, however, many consumers will upgrade their tastes and come
to prefer products more in line with what a connoisseur would prefer. Thus
consumer tastes are both dynamic (across time) and segmented (across people).
“Airline food” finds a wide audience of mildly accepting (if sometimes unen-
thusiastic) consumers and little outright rejection. However, there is common
acknowledgement that a strategy aimed at a least-common-denominator sort of
market does not tend to yield much interesting, tasty food. Similarly, estate-
bottled Bordeaux wines are often better than jug wine blends made in stainless
steel tank farms, but appreciating the quality difference may take some degree
of experience.
[ FLAVOR ]
/ \
( TASTE 3
NASAL SENSATIONS
/ \ / \
CHEMICAL GUSTATION OLFACTION
PROPER PROPER CHEMICAL
IRRITATION IRRITATION
Trigeminal sensations from Trigeminal
sensations, e.g. sweet, sour, salty volatiles, sniffed sensations, e.g.
pepper heat bitter, umami? or in the mouth carbon dioxide
“FLAVOR” “AROMA“
flavor molecules in the mouth pass back up through the nasopharynx and into
the nose from the reverse direction from when they are sniffed, i.e. from the
opposite direction that sniffed aromas enter the front of the nose. The brain is
poor at localizing these sensations, and since the mouth has both taste and tactile
sensations from food present, olfactory sensations are readily (but mistakenly)
referred there (Murphy and Cain 1980). Thus a lemon does not, strictly speaking,
“taste” like a lemon-it tastes primarily sour and a bit bitter and sweet. The
characteristic lemon flavors themselves arise from volatile flavor materials,
largely terpene compounds like citral, which pass up through the back of the
mouth and into the nose via these retronasal passages.
From this process of retronasal stimulation, it is obvious that the vast majority
of food flavors are sensed by the olfactory, rather than the gustatory neural
systems. Gustation itself is limited to sensations such as sweet, sour, salty, bitter
and umami. The taste of monosodium glutamate combined with S’ribosides gives
rise to a characteristic flavor principle in many oriental cuisines (soy sauce is
FOOD QUALITY AND THE SENSE OF SMELL 31
TABLE I .
EXAMPLES OF DAIRY QUALITY DEFECTS: FLUID MILK
Acid Acid
Barny Bitter
Cooked Salty
cowy
Feed Tarfile
Fermented/fruity
Foreign Astringent
Garlicionion
Malty Other
Light Oxidized
Metallic Oxidized Flat
Rancid Lacks Freshness
Unclean
Source: Bodyfelt, F. W., Tobias, J. and Trout, G. M. The Sensorv Evaluation ofDairy Prod-
ucts, Van NostrandiAVI, 1988.
through their volatile flavor characteristics and sometimes by their aroma if they
are sufficiently pronounced. Examples include metallic-catalyzed oxidation fla-
vors, which are caused by aldehydes, enals and di-enals that impart cardboardy,
painty and tallowy sensations (Shipe 1980). Light-catalyzed oxidation is similar,
except that methional (from Strecker degradation of methionine) may impart a
“burnt-haidburnt-feathers” sensation at some early stages of photoxidation.
Various transmitted odors from feed and silage can crop up in milk, including
garlic-type odors in some parts of the country from wild garlic present in Spring
pasturage. Hydrolysis of milk fat can give rise to a type of rancidity characterized
by soapy or cheesy flavors from short-chain free fatty acids. Various microbial
conditions give rise to fruity or fermented flavors, including a malty aroma
induced by contamination by Streptococcus lactis v. maltigenes, which produces
isobutyraldehyde and isovaleraldehyde. Thus the nose is a primary key to the
correct identification of such off-flavors which have been a major focus of dairy
judge training and student judging competitions for decades.
Training in the recognition of fluid milk defects traditionally forms the back-
bone of dairy judging expertise, since many of the fluid milk defects also show
up in other dairy products. Table 2 shows defects for cheddar cheese. Once
again, there are a wide range of volatile flavor and aroma defects, some of which
parallel the problem flavors in fluid milk. A variety of texture defects are also
common problems in cheesemaking, but they receive only half the weight of
flavor defects in arriving at the overall grading score in judging contests (Bodyfelt
et al. 1988). This presumably recognizes that consumers consider flavor defects
like sulfide odor to be somewhat more serious than texture defects such as pasty
or crumbly cheese.
FOOD QUALITY AND THE SENSE OF SMELL 39
TABLE 2.
EXAMPLES OF DAIRY QUALITY DEFECTS: CHEDDAR CHEESE
Acid Acid
Feed Bitter
Fermentedifmity
Garlidonion Texture
Heated
Moldy Corky
Rancid Crumbly
Sulfide Curdy
Unclean Gassy
Whey Taint Mealy
Yeasty Open
Pasty
Short
Weak
(Note: Flavor weighted 10 points, texture weighted 5 )
Source: Bodyfelt, F. W , Tobias, J. and Trout, G. M. The Sensory Evaluation ojDairy Prod-
ucts, Van NostrandiAVI, 1988.
While the literature on dairy product quality has a long history of the analysis
of chemical and sensory manifestations of flavor defects, defect-oriented quality
schemes have many practical problems. One issue concerns the complexity of
attributes such as oxidized. Using the term oxidized is a classification concerning
root causes more than a description of sensory perceptions and it encompasses
a range of flavor experiences. Through chemical analysis of oxidized milk fat,
the major chemical products and their sensory qualities have been identified.
Table 3 shows a number of flavors arising from individual chemicals (mostly
complex aldehydes) that are products of milk fat oxidation (Kinsella 1969; Bad-
ings 1970). At this level, there is little or no simple pr singular “oxidized”
characteristic-somehow this hodgepodge of flavor materials blends into a flavor
complex that is recognizable to the dairy judge. Table 3 also shows that samples
that fall within the oxidized category of defects can take on different sensory
properties depending upon the distinct chemical profile that is produced, the age
of the material, and so on. Characteristics range from cardboard-like in low
levels or early stages of milk fat oxidation to painty, tallowy and even fishy
flavors as oxidation progresses. These same problems are seen by workers con-
cerned with warmed-over flavor in meat, which is a useful sensory term to some,
but an untidy collection of several different flavor notes to other workers in this
area (Johnson and Civille 1986; Lyon 1987). Since warmed-over flavor is also
a result of lipid oxidation, it is not surprising that it share some of the same
flavor characteristics with oxidized milk. A third potential problem in the defect-
oriented schemes is that they describe sensory properties in terms of root causes,
rather than describing sensations per se. This requires an additional inferential
40 HARRY LAWLESS
TABLE 3.
EXAMPLE OF A COMPLEX SYSTEM-OXIDIZED LIPID FLAVORS
process on the part of panelists, who have enough work to do simply assigning
numbers to reflect the perceived strength of different components of a complex
flavor. While such inferences are useful information to plant personnel in quality
control situations, they may be more appropriately assigned to the professional
judgment of the panel leader or manager who interprets the panel data (see Shipe
1990 for a contrasting opinion). Some descriptive systems for other commodities
have avoided these inferential categories and gone to associative terms which
are taught and standardized by physical reference standards. For example, on
the wine aroma wheel (Noble et al. 1987) there is no term for botrytis character
(a result of the noble rot). Presumably, evidence of botrytis would appear as a
combination of apricot, honey and perhaps moldy notes. However, panelists
themselves are not asked to infer whether a wine was botrytised, only to describe
and quantify the flavor or aroma notes they experience. See Rainey (1986) for
a discussion of the utility of physical reference standards in descriptive analysis.
Modeling Acceptance
Turning to consumer acceptance as an indicator of quality, the objective
description of simple odor notes and their intensities by a trained panel can
connect very naturally to consumer acceptance data. This most often takes for
form of a general linear model, where consumer acceptance is predicted as a
function of a group of simple sensory attributes. Multiple regression is commonly
applied to such data, although this general type of model is inherent in response
FOOD QUALITY AND THE SENSE OF SMELL 41
surface methods and various other multivariate techniques such as factor analysis
or principal components. Table 4 shows a set of equations in which consumer
acceptance is modeled as a function of underlying sensory characteristics. These
characteristics are weighted depending upon each one’s influence on overall
acceptance, with defects having negative weighting coefficients. The model can
be expanded to more complex polynomials. For example, flavor notes which
are generally pleasant, but which can be unpleasant at very high levels (i.e.,
you can have too much of a good thing, like sweetness), require a small but
negatively weighted quadratic term to reverse a rising function as intensity in-
creases (Moskowitz 1983). A second common elaboration is to allow for inter-
actions. For example, sugar-to-acid ratio and its sensory correlate of sweetness-
to-soumess is important in many fruit products, especially beverages such as
wine. Consumer acceptance falls off steeply when these attributes are not in
balance. Finally, for those who desire to build models in terms of physical
variables such as ingredients (so many pounds of sugar, etc.j, sensory attributes
can be related to physical ingredients such as sucrose content, by mathematical
relationships such as a power function. However, product formulators should be
wary of modeling directly from ingredients to consumer acceptance. There are
many interactions among food ingredients, some of which are present in the
brain of the perceiver, rather than the chemistry of the product (Lawless 1986).
Mixing ingredients together can produce unexpected results, the most common
of which are masking or suppressive, inhibitory phenomena. Therefore it is
essential to interpolate a set of sensory specifications of product flavors by a
trained descriptive analysis panel between the stage of ingredient formulation
and the mathematics of optimizing consumer acceptance.
TABLE 4.
AN ACCEPTANCE MODEL
There are four themes in this discussion. The first idea asserts that the human
judge is absolutely necessary in the assessment of the sensory quality of foods.
Instruments alone will not suffice, and this is especially true of olfactory attri-
butes. The next three themes point out ways in which gathering perceptual data
from humans encounters difficulties. The second issue concerns the fact that
judges differ with regard to their olfactory abilities. This presents a certain
biological limitation on the sensitivity of the sensory panel as an analytical
instrument and also the degree to which the sensors can be calibrated or trained
to agree. The third theme is that human observers act like measuring instruments
that tend to recalibrate themselves on the basis of extraneous noise factors like
stimulus context, and this is poorly understood but potentially important in
olfactory judgments. The fourth issue is the perennial problem of attaching good
verbal descriptors to smell sensations.
Instrumental-Sensory Relations
Since the invention of gas chromatography in the early 1950’s, chemists have
often sniffed the separated components of effluents from the exit ports of chro-
matographs. Thus the human nose, at least on an informal basis, was an early
detection device. Currently a host of chromatographic or separatory methods are
available to the flavor chemist which when coupled with fingerprinting techniques
such as mass spectrometry, can be used to identify the numerous flavorous
compounds occurring in a natural material. Such information has a variety of
important uses. Once the contributing flavor compounds have been identified,
quality and consistency of a natural product can be assessed using instrumental
means. Differences among cultivars or geographical regions can be explored on
the basis of their chemical profiles. Finally, synthesis of the natural flavor can
be attempted if the contributing compounds are known. The key is to know
which flavor compounds have an influence on the overall aroma or flavor quality
as perceived by the human nose.
At first glance, knowing the concentrations in which flavor and aroma com-
pounds are produced in a natural product would seem to be the key. However,
concentration itself is a poor predictor of human reaction, when thresholds for
a variety of compounds are compared. A threshold, of course, represents the
minimum concentration of compound which elicits some statistically reliable
reaction from people, usually when 50% of the individuals in the test panel will
detect the presence of an odor. There are orders of magnitude in the differences
between the olfactory system’s sensitivity to various similar compounds, for
example, ethyl acetate at about 0.5 parts per thousand in air and ethyl mercaptan
FOOD QUALITY AND THE SENSE OF SMELL 43
at about 0.5 parts per billion (ASTM 1978). In order to assess a compound's
importance in a complex flavor then, it is necessary to make some comparison
to a measure of the sensory impact of the odor on the human smelling apparatus.
Thresholds are one example of such measures.
One technique, which combines the instrumental separation of complex natural
product flavors with assessment of human reactions is CHARM analysis (Acree
et al. 1984). In this procedure, a human observer is seated near the exit port of
a gas chromatograph whose effluents are embedded in a constantly flowing
cooled, humidified stream of purified air. The observer must react to the onset
and cessation of a perceived odor. Multiple runs are conducted at increasing
trinary (factors of three) dilutions of the natural product, until a point is reached
at which no response is elicited at any retention time. Obviously, the greater the
number of dilutions at which a product is detected, the greater its potential impact
in the natural product, i.e. at its naturally occurring concentration. Conversely,
compounds which are undetected or only detected at one or two levels, will
often have no or little odor impact. A major advantage of this procedure is that
human reactions can be cross referenced with retention times on other calibrated
GC runs of the same natural material using a flame ionization detector. When
coupled with techniques such as mass spectrometry, the identity of the detected
compound can be determined as well as an estimate of its concentration.
Obviously, there are a few limitations and pitfalls to this separatory approach.
One limitation is that observing a compound in isolation may not predict how
the human nose will react to a complex mixture of a given substance with the
other compounds present in a natural product. The human sense of smell is an
excellent pattern recognition device. In its usual mode of operation, the nose is
not analytical, but synthetic-the sense of smell takes a complex mixture and
tends to form a unitary perceptual impression from diverse inputs. For example,
a lemon oil extract contains perhaps hundreds of different aroma compounds,
but the nose somehow synthesizes the stimulation pattern into the recognition
of a lemon smell. While observers can be trained to pay attention to individual
odor notes in a complex mixture, this is somewhat unnatural and requires great
concentration. Although a GC-sniffing technique like CHARM can be used to
identify the potential participants in the overall aroma or flavor, it says little
about how the components interact or contribute to the complex pattern of
perceived smells that one recognizes as apricots or peanut aroma, for example.
When present in mixtures, there are both masking and synergistic interactions
that may take place. Masking or inhibition among odor signals is quite common
and well-documented (Cain 1975). This may be one way the brain protects itself
from an overload of information. Synergistic interactions are not so well under-
stood, but there are some hints that several sub-threshold compounds might act
to stimulate the olfactory sense when present together (Day et al. 1963). It is
reasonable to think that an olfactory receptor cell with multiple receptor sites
44 HARRY LAWLESS
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600 800 1000 1200 1400 1600 1800
RETENTION INDEX
FIG. 2. FLAME IONIZATION DETECTOR RESPONSE (UPPER TRACE) TO
COMPONENTS OF ORANGE JUICE
Peak 1021 is limonene and peak 1083 is linalool. CHARM response chromatogram (lower trace)
to the same juice. Peak height in the CHARM chromatogram is proportional to the number of
dilutions at which the observer noticed a smell at that retention time. From Marin et al. (in press),
by permission.
FOOD QUALITY AND THE SENSE OF SMELL 45
it is possible to have a large FID response, but little human reaction and con-
versely a large human reaction, but little or no instrumental detection. This is
even more apparent in the retention times following peak 1083. There are major
odor components present in this zone, to which the instrumental detector is
nearly insensitive. Such a series of CHARM peaks can not be dismissed as
simply noise in the system since they require multiple responses from observers
at those same retention times across many dilutions in order to construct CHARM
peaks of those magnitudes. It should not surprise us that olfaction could be more
sensitive detector than instrumental analyses, given its design features that permit
the amplification of weak signals, as discussed above.
Such techniques also hold great promise for the eventual synthesis of natural
product flavors. Recently, a research group at the Western Regional Laboratories,
USDA-ARS, has used similar techniques to identify the important compounds
in tomato volatiles and even to construct a reasonable approximation of tomato
paste aroma (Buttery et af. 1989; Buttery, personal communication). Using GC
as a separatory method, with human observers smelling the effluents, they were
able to cross-reference sniffing responses with aroma thresholds and identify the
potential contributing compounds to tomato paste aroma. The compounds were
re-constituted into a mixture in concentrations that were indicated by their con-
centrations in the starting materials itself. A mixture of dimethyl sulfide, beta
damascenone, 3-methyl butanal, 1-nitro-2-phenylethane, eugenol, methional and
3-methylbutyric acid was judged by an experienced panel to be a good example
of tomato paste aroma.
TABLE 5 .
DOCUMENTED SPECIFIC ANOSMIAS
L- carvone _- minty
Almost everyone who has been trained in a descriptive analysis panel, a quality
grading system or flavor profile technique has encountered one or two attributes
which are difficult to learn or at least difficult to discern at first. While there are
many factors which impede the correct identification of odors and volatile flavor
(Cain 1979), specific anosmia may be a contributing factor. It is possible that
each panelist comes equipped with a different mosaic of specific odor acuities
and gaps, and that this imposes a limitation on the degree of panelist consensus
that can ever be achieved. Marin (1989) recently studied the reactions of different
ages and sexes to a series of fruity esters and minty compounds through CHARM
analysis, and saw evidence of wide variation in reactivity to common odor
compounds. In spite of the fact that people have some modest ability to describe
and discuss their odor experiences, Marin’s data suggest that we may each exist
in different “odor worlds.” This topic deserves further attention on the part of
sensory evaluation professionals who are involved in the selection and training
of sensory panels. It is also possible that some self-selection may be involved
in that people who are aware of some olfactory deficit may not volunteer for
panels in the first place. Similarly, meat technologists who have experienced
difficulty in smelling boar taint might be reluctant to volunteer for training as
quality inspectors. One major unanswered question concerns the inter-correlation
of specific anosmias, as well as relationships to a person’s acuity for other smells.
A recent study of androstenone sensitivity found a correlation with another
complex ketone, pemenone, as well as an unexpected negative correlation to
odor responses to the floral odor of phenylethanol (O’Connell et al. 1989).
In addition to a need for further research on the underlying biological mech-
anisms of anosmia, questions about the functional significance of individual
differences in olfactory acuity remain unanswered. Functional significance con-
cerns not only issues in panel selection, training and consensus, but the percep-
tions of consumers of complex food flavors in naturally occurring aroma and
flavor mixtures. There is a major gap between our understanding of anosmia in
the laboratory, e.g. through the study of olfactory thresholds in single pure
compounds, and the understanding of anosmia in environmentally encountered
flavors and smells. The study of perception of odor mixtures among anosmic
and normal individuals would help to bridge this gap. Odor compounds interact
in mixtures, most commonly to produce counteraction or partial masking of one
another (Cain 1975; Lawless 19861, suggesting that to an anosmic person, the
compound to which they are insensitive would not mask or counteract other
flavors. These other flavors might then be more intense than they smell to an
osmic (normal) person. Analogous work with phenylthiocarbamide (PTC) tasters
and nontasters in bitter-sweet taste mixtures shows this effect (Lawless 1979).
Tasters of PTC experience partial masking or suppression of sucrose sweetness
in bitter-sweet sucrose PTC mixtures. Nontasters, on the other hand, experience
no such masking.. Sucrose is just as sweet to them as if there were no bitter
FOOD QUALITY AND THE SENSE OF SMELL 49
substance present, which is effectively the case in the sense of what their receptors
are telling their gustatory brain. The study of effects of anosmia on odor mixtures
and complex food aromas may yield analogous interactions.
Context Effects
Context effects are ubiquitous in human perception, and olfaction is no ex-
ception. It is a common tendency for observers to consider the impact of a
stimulus in view of the frame of reference in which it appears. Context effects
are seen easily in cases of contrast. An unusual 40 degree (F) day in January
may seem quite mild, but 40 F is quite cool in contrast to the heat of August.
A normally salted soup may seem quite salty if evaluated in the same session
with low-sodium formulas, but only modestly salty if tasted in the context of
heavily salted alternatives (Lawless 1983). Figure 3 shows classical visual il-
lusions in which a figure is made to appear larger or smaller depending upon
the features which accompany it. These contextual or contrast effects have a
kind of automatic, thoughtless insistence, they seem to occur without the influ-
ence of any conscious process, as if they were hard-wired mechanisms built into
the way the brain interprets sensory messages.
Do context effects appear in evaluation of odor quality? While evaluating
potential reference standards for use in descriptive panel training, the author
noticed an apparent shift in the odor character of a terpene compound, dihydro-
myrcenol. This compound has an odor which is primarily similar to lime. How-
ever, in addition to its citrus character, it has a somewhat pine-like or woody
aspect to many people. When smelled in the context of many reference standards
with pine or woody character, it was perceived by panelist-trainees to be almost
wholly citrus in character. However, when evaluated with a battery of citrus-
smelling materials, the same panelists described it as too woody or pine-like to
include in the reference materials for citrus items. Figure 4 illustrates this shift
quantitatively. Twenty university staff and students, who were otherwise naive
and uninvolved in olfactory evaluations, smelled dihydromyrcenol under two
conditions on different days: In one session following a group of five other citrus
compounds, and in another session following a group of very woody-smelling
materials (pine, cedar, sandalwood, etc.). Dihydromyrcenol was rated on a single
bipolar scale from very citrus to very woody in character. A dramatic shift is
evident in the data, with dihydromyrcenol changing from a primarily citrus
quality in the woody setting to a woody character in the citrus context. This
effect has been replicated under a variety of conditions and with other aroma
materials (Lawless Unpublished ).
One possible explanation for this contextual shift invokes a mechanism of
adaptation. Under conditions of constant stimulation, sensory systems will de-
crease their responsiveness. People are at first aware of a characteristic “house
50 HARRY LAWLESS
B
0
00 0
000
odor” when visiting a neighbor or friend, but after a few minutes this generally
fades from consciousness. Adaptation is an especially potent effect in olfaction,
one that often interferes with the performance of sensory panelists in extended
sessions. It also underscores the need for a clean and odor-free testing environ-
ment in which to evaluate samples. As noted above, odors in mixtures tend to
have inhibitory or suppressive effects, as if the brain was only able to process
a limited volume of olfactory signals. Such inhibition or odor counteraction is
put to good use in the design of fragrances for air fresheners. However, when
one component of an odor mixture is adapted, i.e. perceptually “removed”
FOOD QUALITY AND THE SENSE OF SMELL 51
DIHYDROMY RCENOL
RATED ON BIPOLAR SCALE
MOSTLY CITRUS
;
4 1 1
CITRUS WOODY
CONTEXT
although still physically present, the other component may be released from its
partially inhibited status and increase in perceived intensity. Figure 5 shows the
inhibition and release effect for mixtures of vanillin and cinnamaldehyde. In
vapor-phase mixtures, the cinnamon and vanilla notes are less intense than when
the compounds are presented alone. However, after adaptation reduces the impact
of one of the two notes, the other rebounds to about the level it would be perceived
at if it had been presented alone. Such a process could play a part in the contextual
shift seen with dihydromyrcenol, providing dihydromyrcenol can be viewed as
52 HARRY LAWLESS
CONDITION
applicable to all products or that has been agreed upon by the scientific com-
munity. There is much less consensus than in vision, in which a set of three (or
four) visual attributes can be used to describe all color. The sense of taste is
qualitatively simpler than olfaction, with general categories like sweet, sour,
salty and bitter, and perhaps umami, covering most gustatory experiences. 01-
faction, on the other hand, is more complex. First, there is a tremendous qual-
itative range of aromas and volatile flavors that are perceived. Given no universal
system of primaries, and combined with the fact that there is no well-understood
physical continuum along which odors can be ordered (analogous to wavelength
of visible light in color perception), the only recourse is to define odor experiences
by pointing to objects from which smells emanate. For example, we say that
something smells ‘‘like a lemon. Such an approach necessitates understanding
”
consider a t-statistic, the simplest parametric test for differences between sam-
ples, there are two and sometimes three parameters under the control of the
sensory analyst. A t-statistic takes the following general form, although its exact
numerical form depends upon whether samples are related (dependent) or in-
dependent groups of observers:
The numerator of the t statistic is the observed difference between means. This
is generally not controlled, but rather assessed in the test. However, a good
sensory professional can “train” their clients to send only sets of samples for
testing when the client suspects there may be differences. When the differences
are clearly not perceivable, the test is unnecessary. Conversely, when the dif-
ferences are plainly obvious, a sensory test may also not be needed. Sensory
tests are used most effectively when they reduce some uncertainty in managerial
decision-making. If there’s no uncertainty, there’s no need for the test. Unfor-
tunately, many commercial practices dictate that tests are scheduled on a routine
basis, with little or no negotiation between sensory analyst and client about the
potential impact of the information that is to be provided. Another characteristic
of the t-statistic is the “N” or sample size. Since this divides the standard
deviation in the denominator, the larger the N, the larger the t-value and the
more likely we are to reject the null hypothesis. Thus the sensory analyst who
wishes to perform a sensitive test can use a large number of panelists or many
replicates, to minimize the standard error of the mean. This is a good strategy,
but only up to a point. If the internal panel tests yield significant differences
that the consumer doesn’t notice or doesn’t care about, the test is moot.
The third variable in a t-statistic is the standard deviation, the pure error
inherent in the measurement process, in the samples themselves and in the human
observers. Sensory testing is a difficult technology simply because there are so
many potential sources of variance which feed into this error term. However,
many of these sources can be controlled or influenced by the person conducting
the test, and this is where laboratory rigor will aid in improving test sensitivity.
Blind coding, independent judgments, minimization of distractions, counterbal-
anced or randomized orders of presentation and other environmental and testing
details are critical. Regarding the human factor, screening, orienting, motivating
and training the panel if necessary are trademarks of quality in sensory testing
programs.
The influence of several seemingly minor changes in testing procedures was
illustrated in a study of the detection of boar taint aroma by panelists and their
FOOD QUALITY AND THE SENSE OF SMELL 57
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
REFERENCES
ACREE, T. E., BARNARD, J . and CUNNINGHAM, D. G. 1984. A procedure
for the sensory analysis of gas chromatographic effluents. Food Chem. 14,
273-286.
AMOORE, J. E. 1977. Specific anosmia and the concept of primary odors.
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