Rules to elaborate attribute definitions: Do they improve definition efficiency?

C. Dacremont (1)*, C. Egoroff (2), A. Jauneau3, A. Giboreau(4), S. Guerrand (5), D. Candel (6) et al.

(1) ENSBANA-CESG, France,

(2) PSA Peugeot Citroën, France,

(3) Nestlé France, France,

(4) ADRIANT, France,

(5) SNCF, France,

(6) CNRS, France

For descriptive analysis, handbooks recommend to define each attribute, but do not provide clear indication to write these definitions. In other disciplines, lexicographers have elaborated rules to write definitions and insure their communicative value. The objective of this work is to examine how lexicographic rules may be implemented for attribute definitions, especially for texture attributes, and whether definitions written in such a way are of some benefice for panels’ work.

Twelve attributes and their definitions were selected from the attribute list of two trained panels, one describing the texture of black chocolates (6 attributes) and the other the touch of plastics (6 attributes). The definitions were rewritten according to lexicographic rules defined from a previous work (Giboreau et al., 2003). The efficiency of both initial and rewritten definitions was tested, first, in term of panel performance and, secondly, in term of easiness to understand attributes meaning. A “food panel” was given the six plastic attributes to describe six plastic samples and, similarly, a “plastic panel” received the chocolate attributes to describe six chocolates. Panelists evaluated the products in triplicate at three occasions: first, rating the attributes only, second when a definition was provided and finally, after training. Each panelist received three original and three rewritten definitions.

Considering discrimination abilities and homogeneity of the panel, no statistical superiority was observed with rewritten definitions. However, discussions during the training step and comments of panelists when presented with both definitions at the end of the experiment, revealed a global preference for the rewritten definitions. Rewritten definitions were easier to understand, especially for attributes found ambiguous when presented by themselves.

Giboreau A., Dacremont C., Candel D. & Egoroff C. (2003) Rules to elaborate descriptors definitions using linguitic theory and terminology know-how. 5th RM Pangborn Symposium, Boston, July 20-24, 2003.

Key words: descriptive analysis, attribute definition, writing rules