What goes into making a person choose one thing to eat over another? We think of taste as coming from our tongues and smell coming from our noses, but they are only sensors that feed those particular bits of information to the brain to process like a central computer. When we think about what to eat the brain does a complex dance of for and against based on an array of conscious and unconscious factors involving our higher order systems and our primitive systems in conjunction. Our language facility being amongst the highest of our brain functions, also plays a part in what we choose to eat. The way something is described activates our brain in much the same way our other senses do. This is especially the case in our modern sterile grocery aisle, or when a product is advertised to us. Absent our more base functions of smell and touch, we have to go off sight and hearing. Knowing this, food companies and advertisers have designed descriptors and phrases that are meant to make us read or hear descriptive words that activate our brains to want their product.
How Food Language Affects the Brain
How food is described impacts different areas of your brain that make food appealing or not. In fact, the language of food causes the brain to simulate the act of eating in a way that gives people the sensory effects that motivate a person to eat and rewards them to eat certain foods. Here is what areas are activated in the brain and what the language of food does to them:
Ventral Tegmental Area: This area is responsible for the synthesis and release of dopamine, the neurotransmitter responsible for reward. Descriptive food language triggers the anticipation of reward from eating.
Nucleus Accumbens: This area controls the wanting aspect of motivation. Dopamine is responsible for the reward, but this area of the brain is what makes you feel like you have to have something. Descriptions of high-calorie or indulgent foods activate this part of the brain.
Orbitofrontal Cortex: This area of the brain functions as the mediator of decisions. It allows people to weigh expected rewards or expected punishments from any given action. Food language stimulates this part of the brain to assess the expected reward you will receive (flavor, nutrient density, etc.) versus the expected punishment (bad tasting, will make you sick, etc.).
Anterior Insula / Frontal Operculum: This area is responsible for determining different tastes. Descriptive food language activates this area to simulate what something will taste like.
Somatosensory Cortex: This area is responsible for processing tactile information. In the case of food, this means the sensation of chewing something crunchy or chewy. Food language that describes texture activates this part of the brain to the sensation of crunching, munching, etc. (you can see a pattern forming here).
Dorsolateral Prefrontal Cortex: This area is responsible for executive function and goal-orientation. It’s your ability to override the more primitive desires. This is activated by more abstract goals. The language of health food appeals to this area of the brain and is often in conflict with the more base functions mentioned above.
Amygdala: This area regulates emotional intensity to stimuli. This is how you feel emotions like nostalgia, for example. Food language that plays to an emotional aspect of food activates this area.
The Language of Neuromarketing
As mentioned in the previous article, there is a long history of attempting to use language to convey a feeling, taste or idea that makes one food product desirable to consumers over another. The popular cultural image of an admen in a corner office on Madison Avenue pitching ideas may be a thing of the past, replaced instead by the science of what motivates the brain to want things across sensory modalities. Not only are specific words used, but specific phonetic choices of words in a given language are made to amplify the impact. In English, the sounds of certain words are associated with certain textures and properties of food. Here is how the language of food is used to evoke different positive eating sensations to market products and promote buying:
Crispy/Crunchy: Words that start with the kr- or cr- sound, like crunch, crackle, crisp and crumb evoke the noise associated with the act of biting into something. Your brain can hear and visualize the bite of an apple or potato chip. You remember the positive sensation associated with heating something with a hard texture.
Smooth: Words that start with “s” followed by a consonant like “m”, “w”, “l” or any other descriptors that evokes a flowing nature are used to emphasize smoothness. These are words like, slurp, slick or descriptions of smooth objects like “velvety”. These signify to the brain the flow of liquid and the mouthfeel of something that is smooth like a milkshake or beverage.
Sharpness/Acidity: Words that contain high vowels are known across languages to evoke sharpness. High vowels are pronounced with the tongue arched toward the roof of the mouth. Words like minty, zesty, sticky or fizzy describe the sensation of a fast acting flavor that is acidic. You get a zip of ginger flavor or the zest of lemon.
Dense/Rich: Words that contain low vowels in English evoke a sense of depth. Low vowels are produced with the tongue relatively flat and low in the mouth and with the mouth open a little wider than for high vowels. Words like savory, buttery or luscious are used to describe foods with a richness or depth of flavor. These words help evoke the depth of flavor or the umami sensation in the mouth. The buttery smooth filet mignon on the restaurant menu is meant to signal your brain to imagine this rich flavor and sensation.
As with anything involved with commerce – caveat emptor. Our brains have the ability to make choices that override our base desires. Marketing is not destiny. Being aware of these subtleties can help you be a more informed food consumer. On the bright side, the next time you cook for friends and family you can have fun with the word play of food (backed by science!). So enjoy your next krispy yet velvety meal, but don’t forget to add a zip of flavor to the buttery complexity.
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