Food perception with age and its relationship with consumer liking and memory

This thesis describes experiments investigating the influence of some physiological and psychological factors on food preference and memory in the elderly. Chemosensory perception and food preference were examined in control groups of young adults and in elderly subjects. Age-related differences in smell and taste sensitivity and in food preference were found between the two age cohorts. However, the decline in chemosensory functioning observed among the elderly seemed to play a marginal role in food appreciation. Results suggested that other factors linked with life course such as past influences of personal experiences, familiarity and culture were the strongest determinants of elderly people food choice. Very close to these aspects, memory of food properties was found to be stable with age. Elderly people did not show any difference in incidental learning and memory of food as compared to children and young adults. On the contrary, food memory was found to depend on gender and on how much we like a product. Finally, the results of the present thesis strongly suggest that there is a great variability among the elderly and that it seems unlikely to consider them as a one, homogeneous group.