Morin-Audebrand L. (1), Mojet J. (2), Köster E.P. (2), Issanchou S. (1) and Sulmont-Rossé C. (1)
1 UMR1129 FLAVIC, INRA, ENESAD, Université de Bourgogne, F-21000 Dijon, France
2 Center for Innovative Consumer Studies, Wageningen University and
  Research Center, The Netherlands

Memory plays a central role in food choice and liking. Memory influences sensory and hedonic perception of a food through the generation of expectations based on previous experiences with same or similar foods.

In view of this fundamental role, several studies in recent years focused on obtaining a better insight in the general nature of food memory. Most of these studies used the experimental paradigm developed by Mojet and Köster (2002), based on incidental learning of one or more target foods and a later unexpected memory test, consisting in asking participants to recognize the target amongst some distractors varying from the target on controlled features. The first outcome of these studies is that incidental learning and memory effects occur when participants are confronted with a food. However, observed memory effects mostly depend on distractor rejection rather than on target recognition. This result suggests that food memory is better tuned to detect change rather than to recognize a food previously encountered. Moreover, some results suggest that factors such as sensory modality and hedonic appreciation have an impact on memory performance.

The present work intends to present a critical overview of the main outcomes of food memory studies. A systematic comparison of data from several experiments should allow us to discuss whether some general conclusions could be drawn concerning the insight in food memory.