Olfactory Hedonic Context Affects Both Self-Report and Behavioural Indices of Palatability

Prior exposure to either a pleasant or unpleasant context may affect later hedonic judgments of a common target stimulus. We explored whether this effect translates into behaviour in the chemical senses. In experiment 1 participants experienced either a pleasant or unpleasant set of odours or pictures, followed by an unfamiliar odour. After self-report hedonic evaluations of the odour, participants were allowed to drink it in solution, followed by a further evaluation of its flavour. Participants reported liking the odour less after smelling pleasant odours and drank less of it too, relative to the unpleasant context. There was no differential context effect for emotive pictures. Experiment 2 replicated these effects, but also included a no-context control. This revealed that the consumption effect was localised to the pleasant olfactory context, whilst contextual effects for liking ratings were primarily localised to the unpleasant olfactory context. In conclusion, hedonic context affects both self-report and behaviour, but not in the same way.