Contents
• Food sensory science and evaluation: An overview
• Food sensory science:
• Physiological and Psychological Foundations of Sensory Function
• General requirements in Food Sensory evaluation
• Panelists selection
• Sensory panel
• Sensory evaluation: organization and operation
• Sensory evaluation: Discrimination testing
• Sensory evaluation: Descriptive analysis
• Sensory evaluation: Effective testing
• Data analysis in food sensory evaluation
• Determination of shelf life by sensory evaluation
Consumer Test Methods
By test location
Consumer Test
• Laboratory Tests
• Central Location Test (CLT)
• Special types of CLT: Mobile lab, cart
• Home-Use Test (HUT
Laboratory Tests
• Most frequently used test
• Responses per product: at least 50
• Product number per sitting: 2-5
Laboratory Tests
• Advantages
✓ Convenient location
✓ Laboratory Test
✓ Controlled conditions
✓ Rapid feedback
• Disadvantages
✓ Familiarity with product
✓ Limited information
Central Location Test, CLT
• The most frequently used consumer tests
especially by those conducting Central
Location Test (CLT) market research
Central Location Test, CLT
• Conducted in shopping mall or location accessible
to public
• Consumers: pre-recruited or intercepted
• 100 or more responses per product
• 1- 4 products
Central Location Test, CLT
• Advantages
✓ Large number of respondents
✓ No employees used only “real” consumers
• Disadvantages
✓ Limited resources
✓ Limited controls
✓ Limited tasks performed
✓ Limited food preparation facilities
Special Types of Customer
Location Test
• The method that bring the advantages of both the
laboratory test and the central location test in one test.
• The use of a mobile laboratory provides facilities for
sample preparation and testing that can be
environmentally controlled much like a permanent
laboratory facility, yet provide the numbers and
diversity of consumers that can be intercepted at a
central location.
Special Types of Customer
Location Test
• Participants are usually recruited through
intercepts made at the location where the mobile
laboratory is parked.
• The test is usually run by sensory staff
Special Types of Customer
Location Test
• Advantages
✓ Large number of respondents
✓ No employees used, only “real” consumers
✓ The sample preparation and testing facilities may
allow better control of the testing than many central
location test facilities have to offer.
Special Types of Customer
Location Test
• Disadvantages
✓ The expense of the purchase and maintenance of
the laboratory
✓ Logistical arrangements have to be made prior to
the test for parking and use of power plug-ins
✓ Not all types of food can be tested in mobile lab.
Colmar Brunton's 12.5 m long,
mobile research bus
Home-Use Test, HUT
• Referred to as home placement or in-home placement
tests.
• Require that the test be conducted in the participants’
own homes.
• They provide testing conditions that are not
researcher-controlled, thereby could yield the most
variable results.
Home-Use Test, HUT
• Use consumers or employees
• Responses per product
depends on product
• Test preference, acceptance or performance
• Samples are tested under normal use conditions.
Home-Use Test, HUT
• Advantages
❖ actual use conditions
❖ responses of entire household
❖ marketing information can be obtained
Home-Use Test, HUT
• Disadvantages
✓ Little or no control
✓ Cost
✓ Greater “non-response” rates
✓ Time consuming
Reference
• “Sensory science is increasingly seen as providing
the tools to understand those product
characteristics important in determining
consumer likes and dislikes”
“No matter how excellent a product is, from the
objective view of a scientist focusing on nutrition,
safety, stability and apparent functionality, a
product is not successful if it does not please the
consumer sufficiently to make him or her buy it”
(Karel, 2000)
