Understanding Individual Differences in Acquired Flavour Liking in Humans

The majority of human food likes and dislikes are learned, and there are multiple learning models that explain how flavour liking may be acquired. Two models based on flavour-based learning have attracted considerable attention as potential explanations for acquisition of flavour liking. The first model is based on associations between a novel flavour and an existing liked or disliked flavour (flavour-flavour learning: FFL), and the second is based on associations between the flavour and an effect of ingestion (flavour-consequence learning: FCL). However, experimental studies of acquired flavour liking based on these models have had mixed outcomes, with as many studies unable to find changes in liking post-training as there are studies reporting positive findings. This brief review discusses the extent to which the apparent inconsistency in the literature may reflect individual differences in evaluation of the training flavour in FFL or the consequence in FCL. The conclusion is that an understanding of individual differences can not only help explain the apparent inconsistency of the flavour-learning literature, but it also suggests how differences in sensitivity to these types of learning may have broader implications for both flavour preference development and the potential for overeating.