Coffee packaging and taste association-have you been fooled by the packaging design?

In a study of 174 people, statistical results showed that people expected pink coffee packaging to be "sweet", and green coffee packaging was expected to be "sour". And packaging with sharp patterns is expected to be sour, whether it is pink or green.

 

After the coffee was actually drunk, even if it was in a different color package, there was no significant difference in the evaluation of sweet and sour by the subjects, and the green packaging did not really taste the significantly higher acidity. That's because it's all the same coffee.

 

Where is the interesting part of this research?

 

After the subjects finished their coffee, they were asked two more questions:

 

1. How much do you like this bag of coffee

 

2. How high is your willingness to buy?

 

Regardless of what color and pattern the subjects received, the packages with higher likeness and higher willingness to buy were all packages with "commensurate expectations".

 

In other words, green that looks more sour with sharp patterns that look sour, or pink that feels sweet, and sleek patterns that look comfortable and sweet, are very commensurate, in line with expectations, people will like them more, and will want to buy them. .

 

Why is there such a phenomenon?

 

In order to effectively and quickly learn to understand the surrounding environment, our brain will continue to use what has been learned as a basis to further expand our new knowledge. For example, green apples are sour every time they are eaten. After a few times, we learn that green apples are sour. Then we found that many unripe fruits are green and yellow. After a long time, we can subconsciously feel sour when we see green. . When these expectations conflict with each other, or when the expectations conflict with the facts, we will be more unacceptable.

 

Pink salmon ice cream?

 

Another interesting experiment: The chef Blumenthal of Fat Duck, a three-star Michelin restaurant, designed an unsweetened pink ice product with a smoked salmon flavour. When it was given to people, some of the subjects had "ice cream" written on the label, while the others wrote "frozen savoury mousse."

 

It turned out that the group that they ate pink ice cream had a much lower preference for this sample than the subjects who expected to eat salty mousse. In addition, those who expected to eat ice cream felt that the saltiness, bitterness, and taste of the sample were all stronger than those of the other group.

 

This proves that your preferences for food and the taste you feel are not just a feedback from "tasting". What you expect, what you see or hear, will shape your sensory experience together. Because of this, we usually cover up the name of the bean when we cup it, so as not to affect the judgment of the senses because of the expectation. For example, if you also smell a flower scent, if you know that it is washed with water, you may feel that it is commonplace. , But if you knew in advance that it was wet planing mandheling, you might shout "Amazing!". So back to the coffee packaging, if the message conveyed is "commensurate" and "in line with expectations", the brain is more willing to accept it, and naturally it will receive more praise~