The stability of self-reported emotional response and liking of beer in context

Abstract

Collecting emotional response to products has been found to be more discriminating than liking alone, yet emotions are not static and are highly impacted by mood and our environment (or context). Therefore the question rises whether a consumer’s emotional response to a product is consistent within different contexts, both throughout consumption of a product and with repeated exposure.This study investigated 1) the impact of context (bar vs. central location test) and consumed amount (1 sip, half glass and full glass) on consumers emotional response and liking of beer, 2) test–retest reliability per consumed amount in both contexts, 3) repeated exposure across all sensory sessions including dummy session regardless of consumed amount and context. Beer consumers (N = 97) evaluated emotional response and liking to beer (3.5% ABV) after one sip, half a glass (≈142 ml) and a full glass (≈284 ml), using a short self-report questionnaire in a real life context (i.e. Bar) and central location test (CLT). A subset of 62 participants repeated the session in both contexts to determine test–retest reliability with intra-class correlation (ICC). Prior to the test sessions, emotional response and liking were measured for the same beer during a ‘dummy’ session. ANOVA revealed an overall effect of context where the emotions Shocked, Content, Excited, Nostagic, Disgusted and Curious were rated higher in the Bar than in the CLT (p ≤ 0.01). Consumed amount had limited effect on emotional response and liking. Although the effects in this study were modest, they show no adverse effects of conducting consumer testing in realistic environments on the stability of consumer responses. The ICC scores indicated more stable emotion measurements after consuming a full glass of beer compared to half glass and one sip (p < 0.05) regardless of context, suggesting that stability of emotional response to beer may be slightly higher if representative amounts of product are consumed. Content and Excited emotions were rated significantly higher during the first ‘dummy’ session than the last session (5th) but the effects were modest indicating that a dummy session may not need to be considered in future studies.