The Effects of Color on Food Temperature Perceptions

Red and blue denote warm and cold temperatures on water faucets, air-conditioning systems, weather maps, and thermometers, among other items. The co-occurrence of red/blue hues and warm/ cold temperatures in everyday experiences leads to the formation of learned color-temperature associations which consumers can use to make inferences about products (Wright 1962). However, would incidental exposure to red or blue color cues influence a consumer’s perceptions of the temperature of a focal food/beverage? Specifically, would a consumer rate a food/beverage as having a higher (lower) temperature after seeing a red (blue) color cue? Moreover, what are the downstream behavioral outcomes that result from the integration of visual (i.e., color) cues into haptic (i.e., temperature) perceptions? Prior research shows that individuals are extremely responsive to subtle variations in temperature (Cheema and Patrick 2012) with some areas of the body, such as the fingertips and oral cavity, being able to detect a one degree change in temperature (Jones and Berris 2009). Given that the hands and mouth are the primary inputs involved in food/beverage consumption, it is not surprising that temperature perceptions play an influential role in food/beverage evaluations (Moskowitz, Beckley and Resurreccion 2012). In fact, for many foods/beverages, there is a narrow range of acceptable temperatures and deviation from this range can lead consumers to reject food as unsafe (USDA 2011) or unacceptable in taste (Cardello 1994).