The Effect of Bitter Taste on

The Bitter Bias: Trombetta, Gatley, Ryan, & Anastasio Ambiguous Target Appraisals
Introduction
Method
Embodied cognition is centered around the idea that as a way to process
• The study included 109 participants recruited from a northeastern liberal arts university as part of the research subject pool.
and structure mental processes, many thoughts, feelings, and
• Participants were randomly assigned to drink approximately one ounce of clear liquid that was either bitter, salty, sweet, or neutral
conceptualizations manifest themselves in ways in which the body interacts
(water) in flavor and were then instructed to read a short story about a purposely ambiguous target, taking sips of their flavored
with the environment. Several findings have demonstrated that this has a
solution at interval times throughout the reading
distinct effect in how humans judge and perceive each other. Williams and
• After a short distraction task, participants then rated the target of the short story on eight personality traits (likable, warm, forgiving,
Bargh (2008) showed that holding a warm or cold drink can influence
courteous, honest, hostile, happy, and intelligent) on a six point Likert scale.
one’s warmness or coldness perception of someone else. It has even been
• The first four personality traits (likable, warm, forgiving, courteous) were combined into an index of warmth (alpha = .812) and
shown that the position of a stranger’s photo on a computer screen can bias
participants scores on this index were analyzed across all conditions.
how likely people are to assume the religiousness of that stranger (Meier,
Hauser, Robinson, Friesen, & Schjeldahl, 2007). The purpose of this study
was to explore this connection so as to learn more about complex human
judgment and social perception. Based on the common concept that a
bitter person is often portrayed as someone who is upset about someone,
4 Results
something, or just acts in a jaded manner, it was theorized that something
that tastes bitter is also considered unpleasant and avoided. 3.5 An ANOVA showed that there
was a significant effect of
3 flavored solution type on how
warmly participants rated an
Hypothesis 2.5
ambiguous target F(3, 105) =
3.41; p = .020.
We hypothesized that those in the bitter taste sensation

Warmness Rating
2 Pairwise comparisons
condition would rate the ambiguous target more negatively c identified that cthose in the
compared to the other flavor conditions. Additionally, we bitter condition’s warmth
1.5
predicted that a sweet taste would facilitate more positive rating of the ambiguous target
ratings of the ambiguous target person. (M = 3.26, SD = .98)
1 significantly higher than those
in the sweet condition (M =
0.5
Materials 2.55, SD = .78), p = .007, and
the neutral/water condition
0 (M = 2.50, SD = .97), p = .006.
Flavored Solutions Bitter Sweet Water Salty
• Bitter solution was flat tonic water
• Salty and sweet solutions were created by adding salt/sugar to water Taste Condition
Ambiguous Target Prompt
• Adapted from Erdley and D’Agostino (1998) Discussion
“Over our University's Fall Break, my friend Emily asked me to go to the mall with her to shop for a dress to
wear to her uncle’s wedding. She drove us there in her grandmother’s car, which had a handicapped license
plate. When we got to the mall parking lot Emily passed by the many empty handicapped parking spaces
• Results show that our hypothesis that people in the bitter condition would rate the target less favorable was incorrect. Data
because she was afraid she would be fined for parking in one of those spaces. The rest of the parking lot was very actually support the opposite effect in that the target was rated as significantly warmer after a bitter taste sensation than a sweet
full. When Emily spotted an empty space two rows away, another car cut in front of her before she could pull in,
and Emily honked at the driver and gave them a dirty look. We entered the mall and went into the closest or neutral taste.
clothing store. Emily chose several dresses to try on. When the clerk asked if she could help her, Emily said no – • One potential explanation for the unexpected result is that the bitter taste could result in the participant think the opposite,
she didn’t need the advice of a stranger. I looked around the store while Emily tried on dresses. When Emily
came out she said that her dressing room had had someone’s purse in it, and she had heard its owner knocking similar to the “Macbeth effect” (Zhong & Liljenquist, 2006), where instead of biasing focus on the negative aspects, the bitter
on several nearby dressing room doors inquiring about her purse, so Emily had opened her room door and
handed the purse out to the woman. Just as Emily finished the story, the clerk approached us and asked Emily if
drink primed participants to view the ambiguous target in a more positive manner.
she had made a selection. Emily replied that she would have to go to a better store because this one just did not • Future research should focus on the influences bitter tastes can have on individuals. Particularly, if these findings are indicative
have the quality of dress that she wanted.
of bitter taste sensation activating opposite feelings, more research on the subject would prove valuable to the embodied
“As we walked down the mall talking to each other, Emily noticed a nice bracelet lying on one of the mall cognition literature.
benches. She went over and picked it up, talking excitedly about how pretty it was. Just then a security guard
approached and Emily asked the guard to take it to the lost and found. We walked farther down the mall, and
Emily went into a gift shop while I went to the music store. We met half an hour later, and Emily showed me the
vase she had bought as a wedding gift. She suddenly noticed a scratch on it, and the next thing I knew Emily
References
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Williams, L. E., & Bargh, J. A. (2008). Experiencing physical warmth promotes interpersonal
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me home, and we agreed to go out together again soon.” Zhong, C., & Liljenquist, K. (2006). “Washing away your sins: Threatened morality and physical cleansing.
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