University of California, San Diego
The Department of Psychology is Honored to Present
The Norman Anderson Distinguished Speaker Series
Linda Bartoshuk
Yale University
"Sensory Variation: Supertasters to Pain.
What We Have Learned from Taste."
Presented on May 20, 2004
Location: The Crick Conference Room
Mandler Hall, room 3545
- Abstract:
- Supertasters live in a neon taste world. They match taste
intensities (and oral burn from chilis) to very loud sounds compared
to the rest of us (letting us identify them). Supertasters find
some food sensations too strong. This lowers intake of bitter
vegetables (increasing risk for certain cancers) and fat (decreasing
risk for cardiovascular disease). The failure of some other labs to
identify supertasters led us to examine the validity of using
category and visual analogue scales to make across-group
comparisons. We now know that the intensity descriptors on those
scales (e.g., weak, strong, maximal) have only relative meaning and
denote different absolute perceived intensities in different domains
(e.g., pain vs smell) and to different subjects (e.g., nontasters,
supertasters). Making valid across-group comparisons let us see
genetic variation in taste. Similarly, making valid across-group
comparisons let us see variation in pain (e.g., the worst pain for
men is, on average, less intense that the worst pain when it is
produced by childbirth).
- About the Speaker:
- Linda Bartoshuk is Professor of Otolaryngology and Psychology at Yale
University. Dr. Bartoshuk graduated from Carleton College with a major in
psychology and minors in mathematics and astronomy and then obtained her
Ph.D. in experimental psychology in 1960 from Brown University, working
with Carl Pfaffmann. She is Past President of the Association for
Chemoreception Sciences (AChemS), the Eastern Psychological Association,
and the General Psychology and the Behavioral Neuroscience and Comparative
Psychology divisions of the American Psychological Association. Dr.
Bartoshuk was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the
Society of Experimental Psychologists and has received the AChemS Award
for Outstanding Achievement in the Chemical Senses in 1998 and the New
England Psychological Association Distinguished Contribution Award for
2000. She was awarded an Honorary Doctor of Science degree by her alma
mater, Carleton College, in 2001.
Dr. Bartoshuk's scientific interest has focused on psychophysical research on taste using "experiments of nature" (e.g., genetic variations in the ability to taste and the pathologies / treatments that affect taste). Her mentor, Dr. Pfaffmann, urged his students to apply their research to clinical issues, an exhortation that would later serve as a model for Bartoshuk and her students. Dr. Bartoshuk and her students have discovered that some individuals, known as supertasters, are born with an unusually large number of taste buds. The heightened sensations that they experience pose a methodological challenge. Since we cannot share experiences, how can we compare the taste worlds of different individuals? Attention to this critical problem has revealed widespread misuse of self-report data. Bartoshuk and her students have been working on the development of psychophysical scales than can provide valid comparisons of sensory or hedonic experiences across both individuals and groups.
For More Information About This Speaker:
- http://yalesurgery.med.yale.edu/surgical_spec/faculty/cv/bartoshuk.pdf
Dr. Bartoshuk's curriculum vitae. (PDF file.)
- http://www.pbs.org/safarchive/3_ask/archive/qna/3294_peppers.html
Ask the Scientists: A lighthearted Q&A session with Dr. Bartoshuk.
