Date created: 2024-07-07 02:26 PM | Last Updated: 2025-02-13 11:14 AM

Category: Project

Description: People infer the taste of products based on semantic knowledge (e.g., associations with the category and brand elements). They also link shape features with certain taste qualities through inherent associations commonly referred to as crossmodal correspondences. This research examined how shape features influence the evaluation of familiar and unfamiliar products, and thus varying levels of semantic knowledge. Participants evaluated the expected taste, familiarity, liking, and willingness to purchase products with curved and angular logos presented with sweet, bitter, and neutral characteristics, as well as unfamiliar products. The results confirmed that the curved logos were preferred and associated with greater sweetness, while the angular logos were less preferred and associated with bitterness. However, these differences disappeared when the logos were presented with packages of familiar and unfamiliar products. The expected tastes for the curved and angular logos were also more pronounced when they were framed as representing new or unfamiliar products than sweet and bitter familiar products. These results suggest that feature-based expectations of taste are absent or less pronounced with semantic knowledge about the products.