Taste Matters: Why We Like the Foods We Do

"Taste Matters is a book written by John Prescott, an Australian psychologist who works on the sense of taste and smell and how important they are in determining what people eat. The single most important determinant of what people eat, once you get past availability and cost, is what people like. Liking food means primarily liking its taste or flavor. So, Prescott is very interested in understanding the role of taste and flavor because it’s the most important thing. “The single most important determinant of what people eat, once you get past availability and cost, is what people like.” What Prescott means by flavor isn’t just sweet, sour, or salty, it includes the textures in your mouth and of course the smell that comes out of the food into your nose. Prescott lays out how the systems work and how they influence food. The sensory experience of food is the primary determinant of what we eat, so it’s really important to understand how these systems work. He doesn’t talk about food attitudes. Like, for example, the French tend to think of eating more as a sensory experience and Americans think more about the health effects of food. The French eat slower than Americans, they snack less and when they eat, they eat less so their obesity rate is about half of America’s. A lot of my work is about that. Support Five Books Five Books interviews are expensive to produce. If you're enjoying this interview, please support us by donating a small amount . I’m trying to understand how we can learn from the French and one thing we can do, which we are doing by the way, is consuming smaller amounts. The soda industry for example. Now producers, make soda cans that are much smaller. They make as much money, people consume less, it’s healthier and just as enriching. Food, because of its centrality to life, is a great way to gain insight into differences in cultures. The penetration of McDonalds attests to the universals in the psychology of food, everyone likes fat and sugar. But major differences in what we eat and how we eat persist. That is why food presents ripe opportunities for cultural psychology."