Sensory Research: Most Common Methodologies

Sensory research is a scientific method designed to evaluate products using one or more of the human senses – sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch. The food and beverage industry frequently uses this approach to understand respondents’ preferences and attitude towards their products.

By gathering feedback, businesses can make informed decisions about their products such as the need to adjust recipes, changing packaging, or developing new flavours to reach specific consumer groups.

Choosing the right method to gather feedback from respondents is critical for determining the success of your project. Each approach has its own strengths, limitations, and biases. When selecting an approach, consider your research goals and the type of data you need to support your client’s decision-making. Here are some of the most common methodologies available:

1. Descriptive analysis

Respondents are asked to objectively assess the sensory properties of a product – aroma, flavour, texture, and overall quality – and explain their preferences. This is particularly useful to identify which attributes are more and less important to consumers. This approach typically requires trained panellists who have undertaken a series of calibration sessions to ensure they are consistent in their ratings and evaluations. It’s a powerful tool for businesses who want to optimise their formulas and understand how their products can better meet consumers’ preferences.

2. Discrimination testing

A company considering changing formulations might conduct a discrimination test to understand how altering a product may affect its sensory properties. A common way to collect feedback is the “triangle test.” In this scenario, panellists are presented with three samples, two identical and one different (usually the one with the new formula). The respondent is then asked to identify the odd one out.?

3. Affective testing (hedonic testing)

Affective testing is used to measure respondents' emotional response to a product, such as happiness, sadness, anger, etc, and it can be conducted in several ways. Respondents are usually asked to rate a single sample, or two different versions of the same product. Blind testing can also be used if the respondents shouldn't know what product they are testing. The interviewer may use a rating scale called “The 9-Point Hedonic Scale” that goes from “dislike extremely” to “like extremely”, or use other measurement tools to record responses.?

4. Consumer testing

This is a common qualitative approach used to understand how consumers perceive food or beverage products and identify areas of potential improvement. Consumer testing can take several forms, including but not limited to focus groups, surveys, and in-home usage tests. Focus groups, for example, can be useful to gather insights into consumer preferences, attitudes, and behaviours that go beyond sensory properties, and provide insights related to the group dynamic itself such as social norms, peer pressure, and how individuals influence one another.

To conduct effective sensory research, you will need a partner to plan and organise logistics, and manage your entire sensory research project – and this is where our expertise lies! Get in touch today.