Mane Research Targets the Enhancement of the Consumer Stimulation Experience

25 Feb 2016 --- MANE views the story-telling product development gap as an opportunity for flavor solutions to play a greater role in the marketing success of new food and drink products, with strong potential in the energy market, where stimulation needs to be communicated.

Flavors are sensorial messages received by our brains resulting from 3 receptor systems: the gustatory receptor system (our taste buds perceiving sweet, salty or acid for instance), the olfactory receptor system (the olfactive bulb sensitive to aroma chemicals such as vanillin or eugenol) and a less known receptor system, the trigeminal nerve. This nerve, which has several extremities ending in our oral and nasal cavities, is sensitive to temperature and to trigeminal substances, triggering pain and temperature sensations.

Chili, for instance, contains a substance called capsaicin which is responsible for the burning/hot sensation experienced when you give it a bite. Capsaicin is a trigeminal substance, stimulating the trigeminal nerve. Evolutionists think that our trigeminal system was primitively a system that evolved to prevent us from inhaling dangerous substances. Nowadays, half the planet craves for chili, and experiential sensations; our trigeminal system has turned into another hedonic playground.

Nevertheless numerous studies on food and drinks containing trigeminal compounds or substances conducted by MANE, have led the company’s researchers to think that the primitive warning function of the system has not disappeared entirely. They observed that the food or drinks containing trigeminal compounds were assessed as more stimulating than the same products containing none. They decided to investigate the emotional impact of 2 natural trigeminal compounds in MANE’s portfolio with the help of the Laboratory of Neuroscience of Lyon University (CRNL, France). 
 
Emotions are a very active research field involving several scientific expertises such as neuroscience, biology, cognitive psychology. Following Antonio Damasio’s work on emotion impaired patients, emotions have been seen as the key to our decisions and behaviours. Since the 1980s, physiologists use the bi-dimensional model to measure emotions. According to this model, an emotion has a valence dimension (on a pleasant to unpleasant scale) and an arousal dimension (on a stimulating to not stimulating scale). MANE researchers decided to use this simple model to evaluate their two trigeminal candidates, with a focus on the arousal dimension.

PHYSCOOL the first trigeminal substance studied, is a natural cooling agent, while the second, SENSE CAPTURE TINGLING, is a natural trigeminal compound delivering a tingling sensation.

The research was conducted in January 2015 in the CRNL laboratory. 30 volunteers were asked to consume different flavored water samples while the researchers were monitoring their physiological responses. Two different flavor tonalities were included in the protocol: orange and strawberry. 3 concentrations for each trigeminal compound were evaluated: no trigeminal, low concentration, medium concentration.

Interestingly, the results showed that both trigeminal compounds were significantly lowering the skin temperature of the subjects post-stimulus. Peripheral temperature is an index of sympathetic arousal (Jacob et al 2001). Arousal causes an increase in peripheral vasoconstriction, which decreases the perfusion of blood in the tissues and induces therefore a cooling down of the skin. This effect in the study was independent of the flavor tonality (orange and strawberry) and of the trigeminal compound included (the PHYSCOOL flavored water samples had the same effect as the SENSE CAPTURE TINGLING flavored water samples). On the other hand, the higher the concentration of trigeminal was, the higher the effect. Hence the decrease in skin temperature by both PHYSCOOL and SENSE CAPTURE TINGLING appears to reflect an arousing/stimulating effect of these trigeminal compounds on the autonomic nervous system activity.

This research opens new perspectives to product experience design for new products positioned on a stimulation/energy territory. While marketing will tell the story, design the packaging and create the communication supports, R&D will be able to tweak the product flavor with those unique trigeminal compounds. Depending on the concentration level, those compounds will also bring more or less perceivable sensations such as cooling, tingling, mouthwatering. Consumers will then be able to enjoy carefully crafted product and message, reinforcing one another at both psychological and physiological levels. This is a new and exciting use for trigeminal compounds in food and drink products which had not yet been explored till now.

“Brands will be able to enter the trigeminal dimension, bringing the consumer experience to a new stimulation level that can be objectively observed,” Dominique Delfaud Director Market Intelligence Strategic Development at Mane told FoodIngredientsFirst.