Scaling of Sensory Impressions

Abstract

Generally valid translation of the seven colors of the rainbow into the sounds of an octave was established. Over 500 replies were collected from all over the world to the questions about associations between those colors and the five basic tastes (sweet, salty, sour, bitter, umami) and between those colors and seven selected odors (ethereal, floral, camphor, pungent, putrid, peppermint, musky). Based on the replies, a list of standard associations was constructed. Units of taste, called mniams, and odor, called fooys, were introduced. These units, together with the specific permutation system, provided quantification of sensory impressions, quantitative evaluation of deviations from the standard, and translation of one sensory impression into another. PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS Standardization of sensory impressions could be helpful in the understanding and interpretation of emotions. Expression of the sensory impressions with some units might provide a quantification of temporary and permanent deviations from the standards. It could also be a convenient tool in passing information to people with malfunctions of certain sensors, or people with unusual talents and abilities. Simultaneous involvement of standardized expressions of human sensory impressions would be possible providing an increased efficiency of transmission of multisensory information and an increase in human sensitivity to the signals coming from outside. Trained conjugated perception of sensory impressions would be helpful in early warning against approaching disasters, health breakdowns, and so on. Potentially, some feelings called intuition would be lifted to the position of interpretable impressions. The presented method should be of particular interest to the fields of psychology, psychiatry, criminology, sociology and therapy. It should also attract the attention of product designers, and of sensory analysts in food designing and nutrition.

Assessing the expectations associated with pharmaceutical pill colour and shape

“…For example, the North American participants in Experiment 2 expected the white tablets to taste more bitter than the blue, pink, or orange tablets. By contrast, the colour word ''white'' has been consistently shown to be associated with the taste term of ''salty'' (Koch & Koch, 2003;O'Mahony, 1983;; whereas the colour terms of black (O'Mahony, 1983; and violet (Tomasik-Krótki & Strojny, 2008) were associated with the taste term bitter (see Spence et al, in press, for a review). However, the colours black and violet were not tested in the present study as they are rarely used for medicines; similarly, people's expectations concerning the salty taste were not tested in the present study, as it is a rare taste for the medicines.…”

The association between the colour of a container and the liquid inside: An experimental study on consumers’ perception, expectations and choices regarding mineral water

“…For example, the colours red and orange were shown to be positively associated with sweet, green and the colour yellow with sour and white with salt. In contrast, green, brown, black and grey were found to be negatively associated with sweet and red, blue, brown, purple, black, grey and white negatively linked to sour (Koch & Koch, 2003;O'Mahony, 1983; see also Tomasik-Krótki & Strojni, 2008, for the effect of crosscultural factors on the associations between basic tastes and colours; see , for a review on this topic).…”

On tasty colours and colourful tastes? Assessing, explaining, and utilizing crossmodal correspondences between colours and basic tastes

“…The sample tested in these studies therefore likely qualify as biased toward WEIRD individuals who, following Henrich et al [25] acronym, represent the small minority of people leaving in Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic countries. By contrast, the other three (larger) studies [24,65,71] were all recruited from a broader demographic base. Nevertheless, the results of these five studies look broadly similar, thus implying that the WEIRDo's in this case were not so strange after all, or perhaps, more reassuringly, that such crossmodal correspondences transcend education and cultural background.…”

“…Interestingly, the only colours not to show any positive colour-taste associations were blue, purple, and grey. In 2008, Tomasik-Krótki and Strojny had their participants (a convenience sample of more than 500 individuals from 17 different countries, covering a number of continents) via questionnaire: "how they link the colours, red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and violet to the tastes bitter, sweet, umami, sour and salty" ( [65], p. 253). The wording of the article itself is a little ambiguous as to what exactly the participants had to do.…”

“…The key question here, though, is whether we can ever be sure that the mappings that have been suggested by writers and designers really do appeal to a wider audience? An intriguing body of empirical research conducted over the last three decades now shows that all of us (no matter whether we are synaesthetes or not) do indeed match basic tastes to colours in ways that are far from arbitrary-in the sense of being regular across individuals and consistent over time [24,28,35,65,71].…”