Interesting study on taste buds
An interesting study was done by Linda Bartoshuk of Yale University Medicine, which the author of the diet book I am reading has extrapolated into affecting our eating habits. Linda tests people's genetic ability to taste by asking them to taste a small piece of paper that contains a substance called PROP. To nontasters the paper is tasteless, to medium tasters, the paper is moderately bitter, and to supertasters, the paper is intensely bitter. When she swabs blue food coloring onto the tongues of her subjects, she can see differences. Fungiform papillae (structures that contain taste buds) do not stain well so they are visible as small pink circles against a blue background. Nontasters have the fewest fungiform papillae and supertasters have the most. Not surprisingly, supertasters experience the most intense tastes. Since taste buds are surrounded by pain neurons, supertasters also experience the most intense oral burn from chili peppers.
The diet book author (sorry..I forgot to bring that information in) then extrapolates that nontasters, since they don't have as many taste buds, will tend to overeat to get the intensity of flavor and satisfaction, whereas a super taster will be satisfied with only a small amount of food, since the favor satisfaction is immediate. So...our desire or tendency to overindulge may be physiologically based, and we are fighting an uphill battle. (As if we didn't know that!...we are always fighting the uphill battle). Interesting, isn't it?
ACTIVITY: ARE YOU A SUPERTASTER?
Here's a simplified adaptation of Bartoshuk's taster test: you could try using blue food coloring and a plastic reinforcement ring for a three-hole binder (paper reinforcement rings get mushy). Use a cotton swab to wipe some blue food coloring on the tip of your tongue. Place the ring on your tongue. If you are a medium taster, you'll see only a few little "mushrooms" inside the ring's opening. If you're a supertaster, you'll find more than 25 of them within the circle. How many do you count? If you don't have a reinforcement ring, just look and see the number of pink dots. A non taster will show polka dots, on a few pink ones, medium taasters will show half white, half pink, and supertasters will be covered with pink dots.
|
