Supertasters Essay

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Josh Bishop
Supertasters
Supertasters by Josh Bishop
Taste is a sophisticated and interesting sense of the body that the majority of humans rely on every day. From the time we are born we like or dislike food and drink based on how they taste. Some people have disliked many particular tastes since they were born. Most of these people are known as picky eaters, but is there more to being a picky eater than disliking many foods and tastes? This report will cover the sense of taste, taste buds and how they work, the effect of the number of taste buds on flavor perception and its impact on our lifestyles, along with the concept of a supertaster.
The sense of taste is extremely complicated and complex. When food is tasted, the body not only uses the tongue but also …show more content…

Women and people from Asia, Africa, and South America are more apt to be supertasters (“Science of Supertasters” 1).
One way to identify people as being non-tasters, medium tasters or supertasters is based on their sensitivity to the bitter chemical 6-n-propylthiouracil
(PROP). Non-tasters do not taste the bitterness of PROP, medium tasters can taste the bitterness but do not mind the taste, and supertasters find the taste of PROP unbearable (“Science of Supertasters” 1). Young people are also strongly affected by PROP. Children, unlike adults, taste PROP’s bitterness every time. This could be a reason why children tend to be more picky eaters than adults (“Science of Supertasters” 1).
It may be that genes are affecting our taste perception. Recent studies have shown that humans can taste fat and this may influence our food choices (Tepper/Keller 1). This could be a reason for the recent obesity epidemic (Tepper/Keller 1). This could also relate to the fact that obese people may be more likely to be non-tasters or medium tasters. “A great deal of progress has been made in identifying the genes that may contribute to obesity.”

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