Does Smell Effect Taste?

Each year, our kids' elementary school has what they call the "Great Brain" night, where students can come and showcase a science project, a research project, or art work.  It does take a lot of time, but it's usually really fun to walk around and see all of the end results of student's and parent's hard work.

 

The 4th graders are required to complete a science project each year the week of Great Brain...so of course a lot of 4th graders participate.  This year, Brooklynn decided to do an experiment to see how the sense of smell effects taste.

Here Brooklynn is at the Great Brain night setting up her powerpoint presentation.

She chose 4 foods that were similar in texture, but different in taste.  She chose chocolate pudding, mozzarella cheese, vanilla pudding, and sharp cheddar cheese.

Then, she had her 5 test subjects blindfolded and put nose plugs in...and gave them a sample of each food.  They had to taste it, and then tell her what the food was.

Test subject 1:  Taylor 13 yrs

Test subject 2:  Matthew 6 years

Test subject 3:  Lainah 5 years

Test subject 4:  Rachel 12 years

Test subject 5:  Andy 30 something.

 We made sure to give each test subject a new, clean pair of nose plugs...in case you wondered.  Brooklynn had lots of fun administering the samples and writing down the data.  I had a blast filming and taking pictures.  It was actually pretty hilarious most of the time to see their reactions.

 

 

 Taylor's guesses...he was pretty close.  He couldn't tell the difference in the puddings, he said they tasted exactly the same.

 Matthew thought the chocolate pudding was honey...and the vanilla was strawberry yogurt.  Brooklynn and I were stifling giggles through his entire turn...especially when he named off the two cheeses.  I didn't even know he new about swiss or Colby jack cheeses.

 

 Lainah came next and she too couldn't tell the difference in the puddings OR the cheeses.  She said they tasted exactly the same. 

 

 Rachel was tied with Andy for correct guesses.  They both took a longer time holding the food in their mouths before swallowing.  They said that because you couldn't see it or smell it...it took longer to figure out what you were tasting.

 

 And lastly, Andy's guesses.  Brooklynn and I were surprised when he guessed tapioca pudding because the pudding wasn't lumpy...that was interesting.

 

And here is  Brooklynn right before we had the first test subject come in.  Everyone had a clean spoon....and inbetween each taste they got a sip of water from their own water glass.  I was impressed on how thorough Brooklynn was in her preparation.  So overall, she found out that her hypothesis was correct, that the sense of smell does greatly effect our sense of taste.  The subjects were able to differentiate between textures pretty easily...but then it was really difficult to tell two different flavors of the same texture apart.

Great job Brooklynn!  Another year of Great Brain finished...and she got a perfect score from her teacher on her science project, all of her paperwork and her classroom presentation.  Way to go!