Methods for collection and stimulation of whole mouth saliva were compared. Resting salivary flow values were roughly equivalent for draining, spitting, suction, and swab collection techniques, but the swab technique was less reliable. Gustatory and masticatory stimuli induced significantly higher salivary flow compared to resting levels, but the between- and within-subject variances were also higher. Stimulation produced a fairly constant addition of saliva whether individual resting flow levels were low or high.

There is considerable difficulty in the making of initial clinical decisions as to whether a given patient has salivary gland hypofunction, and hence requires additional salivary gland evaluation. This study identified a set of four clinical measures that, together, successfully predicted the presence or absence of salivary gland hypofunction. The four measures were: dryness of lips, dryness of buccal mucosa, absence of saliva produced by gland palpation, and total DMFT; they were derived from discriminant analysis of data collected from 71 individuals with normal and low salivary flow rates. These measures are proposed as criteria for clinical decision-making, as well as for classification of patients in studies of salivary gland dysfunction syndromes. This study also identified unstimulated whole salivary flow rates of 0.12-0.16 mL/min as the critical range separating individuals with salivary gland hypofunction from those with normal gland function.

No abstract

The relationships lretween biting and chewing sounds and judgments of food crispness vfere examined in two studies. In the fist, subjects used magnitude es1 imation to separately judge the loudness of chewing sounds and the crispness of a wide range of wet and dry crisp foods. Judgments of perceived crispness and loudness were highly correlated both when food samples were fractured by single bites and when further broken down by chewing. In the second study, biting and chewing sounds were blocked by a loud masking noise.

This research was supported in part by NIH Training Grant 5T32NS-07068 from NINCDS to the Monell Chemical Senses Center and a Grant-in-Aid from Sigma Delta Epsilon to the author. Appreciation is expressed to the Hercules Corporation. Wilmington. Delaware, particularly to Hal Jabloner, for supplying the CMC and for providing valuable advice. The author also wishes to thank Gary Beauchamp and Robert Cagan of the Monell Center for their helpful comments and Davis Diehl for her technical support.