Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-tf8b9 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-23T03:54:05.897Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

“Nothing Good Ever Came from New Jersey”: Expectations and the Sensory Perception of Wines*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 October 2014

Robert H. Ashton
Robert H. Ashton*
Affiliation:
The Fuqua School of Business, Duke University, 100 Fuqua Drive, Durham, NC 27708; e-mail: [email protected].
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The influence of expectations on the sensory perception of wines is investigated in three studies in which New Jersey and California red wines are blind tasted. Studies 1 and 2, in which only the color of the wines is known prior to tasting, demonstrate that neither wine club members nor experienced wine professionals can distinguish between New Jersey and California wines in terms of personal enjoyment. In contrast, Study 3, in which tasters are informed that some (though not which) of the wines are from New Jersey, finds that when a wine is believed to be from New Jersey it receives lower enjoyment ratings than when the identical wine is believed to be from California—regardless of whether the wine is actually from New Jersey or California. The results enhance our understanding of the role of expectations in the interpretation of subjective experiences. Implications for wine producers and wine consumers are explored. (JEL Classification: C91)

Keywords

California winesexpectationsNew Jersey winesnonsensory cuessensory perception
Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Wine Economics , Volume 9 , Issue 3 , December 2014 , pp. 304 - 319
Copyright
Copyright © American Association of Wine Economists 2014 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

*

I am indebted to Alison Ashton for insightful comments on an earlier version, to Mani Sethuraman for excellent research assistance, and to Andrew Lazarus for his generosity in arranging the tasting involving wine professionals. I also appreciate the helpful comments of an anonymous reviewer and the editor.

References

Amerine, M.A., and Roessler, E.B. (1983). Wines: Their Sensory Evaluation. New York: W.H. Freeman.Google Scholar
Ashenfelter, O., and Storchmann, K. (2012). Editorial: The Judgment of Princeton and other articles. Journal of Wine Economics, 7, 139–142.Google Scholar
Ashton, R.H. (2014). Wine as an experience good: Price versus enjoyment in blind tastings of expensive and inexpensive wines. Journal of Wine Economics, 9, 171–182.Google Scholar
Bowen, D.J., Tomoyasu, N., Anderson, M., Carney, M., and Kristal, A. (1992). Effects of expectancies and personalized feedback on fat consumption, taste, and preference. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 22, 1061–1079.Google Scholar
Brochet, F. (2001). Chemical object representation in the field of consciousness (application presented for the Grand Prix of the Académie Amorim following work carried out toward a doctorate from the Faculty of Oenology, University of Bordeaux).Google Scholar
Brochet, F., and Dubourdieu, D. (2001). Wine descriptive language supports cognitive specificity of chemical senses. Brain and Language, 77, 187–196.Google Scholar
Cardello, A.V. (1994). Consumer expectations and their role in food acceptance. In MacFie, H. J. H. and Thomson, D. M. H. (Eds.), Measurement of Food Preferences. Glasgow: Blackie Academic and Professional.Google Scholar
Carlsmith, J.M., and Aronson, E. (1963). Some hedonic consequences of the confirmation and disconfirmation of expectancies. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 66, 151–156.Google Scholar
Darley, J.M., and Gross, P.H. (1983). A hypothesis-confirming bias in labeling effects. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 44, 20–33.Google Scholar
Davidson, A. (2013). Bottle bing: How New Jersey could make itself the next Napa. New York Times, March 17, www.nytimes/com/2013/03/17/magazine/.Google Scholar
Deliza, R., and MacFie, H.J.H. (1996). The generation of sensory expectation by external cues and its effect on sensory perception and hedonic ratings: A review. Journal of Sensory Studies, 11, 103–128.Google Scholar
Gawel, R. (1997). The use of language by trained and untrained experienced wine tasters. Journal of Sensory Studies, 12, 267–284.Google Scholar
Ginsburgh, V., and Zang, I. (2012). Shapley ranking of wines. Journal of Wine Economics, 7, 169–180.Google Scholar
Goldstein, R., Almenberg, J., Dreber, A., Emerson, J. W., Herschkowitsch, A., and Katz, J. (2008). Do more expensive wines taste better? Evidence from a large sample of blind tastings. Journal of Wine Economics, 3, 1–9.Google Scholar
Hoch, S.J., and Deighton, D. (1989). Managing what consumers learn from experience. Journal of Marketing, 53, 1–20.Google Scholar
Hughson, A.L., and Boakes, R.A. (2001). Perceptual and cognitive aspects of wine expertise. Australian Journal of Psychology, 53, 103–108.Google Scholar
Hughson, A.L., and Boakes, R.A. (2002). The knowing nose: The role of knowledge in wine expertise. Food Quality and Preference, 13, 463–472.Google Scholar
Hurling, R., and Shepherd, R. (2003). Eating with your eyes: Effect of appearance on expectations of liking. Appetite, 41, 167–174.Google Scholar
Klaaren, K.J., Hodges, S.D. and Wilson, T.D. (1994). The role of affective expectations in subjective experience and decision-making. Social Cognition, 12, 77–101.Google Scholar
Lawless, H.T. (1984). Flavor description of white wine by “expert” and nonexpert wine consumers. Journal of Food Science, 49, 120–123.Google Scholar
Lee, L., Frederick, S., and Ariely, D. (2006). Try it, you'll like it: The influence of expectation, consumption, and revelation on preferences for beer. Psychological Science, 17, 1054–1058.Google Scholar
Lehrer, A. (1975). Talking about wine. Language, 51, 901–923.Google Scholar
Lehrer, A. (1983). Wine and Conversation. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.Google Scholar
Lehrer, A. (2009). Wine and Conversation. 2nd ed.New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
March, J.G. (1991). Exploration and exploitation in organizational learning. Organization Science, 2, 71–87.Google Scholar
Morrot, G. (1999). Can we improve taster performance? Journal International des Sciences de la Vigne et du Vin (special issue on wine-tasting), 29–35.Google Scholar
Peynaud, E. (1987). The Taste of Wine: The Art and Science of Wine Appreciation. (Schuster, M., Trans). San Francisco: Wine Appreciation Guild.Google Scholar
Plassmann, H., O'Doherty, J., Shiv, B., and Rangel, A. (2008). Marketing actions can modulate neural representations of experienced pleasantness. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 105, 1050–1054.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Quandt, R.E. (2012). Comments on the Judgment of Princeton. Journal of Wine Economics, 7, 152–154.Google Scholar
Sauvageot, F. (1999). Sensory evaluation. Journal International des Sciences de la Vigne et du Vin (special issue on wine-tasting), 61–69.Google Scholar
Schifferstein, H.N.J., Kole, A.P.W., and Mojet, J. (1999). Asymmetry in the disconfirmation of expectations for natural yogurt. Appetite, 32, 307–329.Google Scholar
Smith, R. (2013). The trick to selling fancy wine from New Jersey: Don't say it's from New Jersey. www.npr.org/blogs/money/2013/03/29.Google Scholar
Solomon, G.E.A. (1990). The psychology of novice and expert wine talk. American Journal of Psychology, 103, 495–517.Google Scholar
Solomon, G.E.A. (1997). Conceptual change and wine expertise. Journal of the Learning Sciences, 6, 41–60.Google Scholar
Taber, G.M. (2006). Judgment of Paris: California vs. France and the Historic 1976 Paris Tasting That Revolutionized Wine. New York: Scribner.Google Scholar
Taber, G.M. (2012). The Judgment of Princeton. Journal of Wine Economics, 7, 143–151.Google Scholar
Tuorila, H., Meiselman, H., Cardello, A., and Lesher, L. (1998). Effect of expectations and the definition of product category on the acceptance of unfamiliar foods. Food Quality and Preference, 9, 421–430.Google Scholar
Veale, R., and Quester, P. (2008). Consumer sensory evaluations of wine quality: The respective influence of price and country of origin. Journal of Wine Economics, 3, 10–29.Google Scholar
Wansink, B., Park, S.B., Sonka, S., and Morganosky, M. (2000). How soy labeling influences preference and taste. International Food and Agribusiness Management Review, 3, 85–94.Google Scholar
Ward, D.L. (2012). A graphical and statistical analysis of the Judgment of Princeton. Journal of Wine Economics, 7, 155–168.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weil, R.L. (2001). Parker v. Prial: The death of the vintage chart. Chance, 14, 27–31.Google Scholar
Weil, R.L. (2005). Analysis of reserve and regular bottlings: Why pay for a difference only the critics claim to notice? Chance, 18, 9–15.Google Scholar
Weil, R.L. (2007). Debunking critics’ wine words: Can amateurs distinguish the smell of asphalt from the taste of cherries? Journal of Wine Economics, 2, 136–144.Google Scholar
Wilson, T.D., Lisle, D.J., Kraft, D., and Wetzel, C.G. (1989). Preferences as expectation-driven inferences: Effects of affective expectations on affective experience. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 56, 519–530.Google Scholar