New Approach to Food Difficulty Perception: Food Structure, Food Oral Processing and Individual's Physical Strength

Abstract

This study aims to study the effect of the interaction between food physics and human physical strengths on food oral processing and difficulty perception in the young population. As the first step in human nutrition is the food oral processing, special emphasis has been given to the oral strengths. Fracture mechanics of fifteen commonly consumed food products of fruits, vegetables and dairy origin were analysed using penetration test. Among the different products studied, six products (carrot, banana, mozzarella, potato, soft cheddar and hard cheddar) were selected and given to 11 young participants (<25 y.o.). Individual physical assessments included measurements of dominant hand grip force, isometric tongue pressure and bite force. Participants ranked the food products in the order of difficulty perceived using a visual analogue scale. Additionally, the number of chews and the time at swallow were analysed from video-recording for each participant. Food score difficulty showed that high break force of food products were related linearly with difficulty perceived (r 5 0.729) and with higher oral processing time (r 5 0.816). Other food breakdown characteristics such as number of peaks and gradient of the penetration curves showed linear correlation with mastication time (r 5 0.830, r 5 0.840) and number of chew cycles (r 5 0.903, r 5 0.914). However, no relationship could be established between individual physical forces (hand and oral) and food perception difficulty for young participants interviewed. This might be attributed to the selected healthy and young population having higher hand force/tongue force ratio, which might not interfere with their eating process. PRACTICAL APPLICATIONSThis study investigates the relationship between human physical strength (with special emphasis into oral forces), food difficulty perception of food of different textural properties and their chewing and swallowing behavior. The main hypothesis of this work is that healthy young population with different levels of oral strengths and eating behavior will perceive food difficulty as a function of food textural characteristics and their individual capability of eating. To do that, eating capability measurements has been combined with texture analysis and video-recording of individual eating process (first bite-to-swallowing event). Understanding the interplay of physical, physiological and psychological elements of oral processing is a relative new area of research. Thus, the combination of tools and insights generated in this article could be a bridge between oral physiology and food science, and also could be of interests to new product developers in designing food with just-right texture.Journal of Texture Studies 00 (2016) 00-00 V C 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Perception and measurement of food texture: Solid foods

“…Laguna, Asensio Barrowclough, Chen, and Sarkar () studied the eating difficulty of six products (carrot, banana, mozzarella, potato, soft cheddar, and hard cheddar) and found that the hardest food, carrot required a greater number of chews and the longest processing time in mouth, which they found in accordance with the conclusion by Witt and Stokes (). However, hard cheddar was found the most difficult although it resided a shorter time in mouth and the break force was lower than carrot, which led these authors to think that it is not only the force at break but also the structural property of the food that plays an important role in perceived difficulty.…”

Measuring eating capability, liking and difficulty perception of older adults: A textural consideration

“…This is a non-invasive method which has ecological validity and is relatively simple to undertake. A pilot study was done in young population to check its validity and to identify any difficulty in the performance (Laguna, Asensio Barrowclough, Chen, & Sakar, 2016). Since dental status is likely to influence oral processing time and eating capability, the relationship between dentition, EC, oral processing and subjective measures was also investigated.…”

New Food Products for Sensory‐Compromised Situations

“…Laguna et al. () also reported that the subjects could not open all of the packaging tested. The forces needed to open the packaging did not seem to be too high in relation to the subjects’ abilities as demonstrated through grip‐and‐pinch strengths.…”

“…Laguna, Barrowclough, Chen, and Sarkar (), as part of the Optimizing Food for the Elderly Population Project (OPTIFEL) (http://www.optifel.eu), found that the most difficult closure type to open was the screw‐top (often vacuum‐packed) cap (Figure ). Other closures such as pull‐tab cans, tin‐can lids, easy‐to‐open packages, and opercula (Figure ) were cited as difficult to open by several populations (opercula is Latin and means “little lids”; it is the plural of operculum).…”

“…Odor losses may also be associated with some viruses and certain drugs (Mann, ; Schiffman, ). However, many chemosensory losses are gradual and progressive and are not associated with a particular event (Stevens, Cruz, Hoffman, & Patterson, ; Yousem, Geckle, Bilker, McKeown, & Doty, b).…”