By: Greg Uyeno, Staff Writer Published: 09/06/2016 11:14 AM EDT on LiveSciencePeople have strong feelings about meat ' not only about how it tastes, but also how the animals that provide it are raised. In fact, those feelings are so strong that they actually influence the way people perceive themeats taste, a new study says.In the study, people reported that meat that carried a label saying it was from a factory farm tasted worse than meat labeled as humanely raised, when the samples were actually identical.The researchers said the results are a basic demonstration that our affect ' which is a technical term for the ingredients of our emotions ' can influence our experience of eating food. [Top 7 Germs in Food That Make You Sick]Youre always in an affective state that colors what you see and hear, and now, we know also [that it influences] what you taste and how much food you eat, said study co-author Lisa Feldman Barrett, a professor of psychology at Northeastern University in Boston and author of the forthcoming book How Emotions Are Made (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2017).In the study, the researchers did three experiments, involving samples of beef jerky, roast beef and deli ham, that came with different descriptions. For example, the humanely farmed description of ham said, This ham was raised on a farm that focused on animal welfare, and mentioned grassy pastures and the chance for pigs tosocialize with other pigs.Meanwhile, the factory-farm version read, in part: This ham was produced at a factory farm that focused on production. In this particular experiment, participants first ate unlabeled ham to test their baseline perception.In all three experiments, the researchers found that the participants gave different scores to the samples that were labeled differently, even though the meat samples were actually identical. In general, the participants who read descriptions offactory-farming practicesate less, were less likely to say they would eat that meat again and said they would pay less for it.In one trial involving ham, participants even gave different ratings to specific aspects of the flavor of the meat that was labeled as being from a factory farmthey said it was saltier and greasier than the humanely raised meat.Barrett said she expected that the participants would rate the meat labeled as humanely raised more highly, but the participants did not rate that meat better than samples with either no label or a neutrally-worded description.This could be because the meatall of which actually came from a farm that advertises having humane practiceswas high-quality to begin with, and thus there was little room for improvement, the researchers said. Or, it could be because the participants, most of whom were college students, assumed the meat wasfarmed in a humane fashionunless they were told otherwise, Barrett said.We know, in many ways, that our expectations change our way of seeing the world, said Dan Ariely, a behavioral economist at Duke University who was not involved in the study. And the researchers pointed to past work that showed that labels that say organic, eco-friendly and fair trade may all affect peoples perceptions of food. [6 Foods That Are Good For Your Brain]However, Ariely said it was not clear what factor was actually driving the effect seen in the study.Whats unclear from the study is whether its a moral issue, or an issue that has to do withexpectations about taste, Ariely said. In other words, the students may have responded more negatively to eating the factory-farm meat because of their moral issues with factory-farm practices, or they might have had a negative association with the quality of those products.Barrett noted that the researchers were not trying to evaluate the students morality about factory-farm meat but rather were using labels to change the participants dispositions. We were interested in whether affect influences taste and eating behavior, she said.Ariely said theres value in exploring precisely what people expect from their food, and what effects those expectations may have.Next, the researchers will manipulate specific qualities of the meat, such as its saltiness, to help quantify the size of the effect beyond how people report the experience, Barrett said. They may also try to find the conditions under which a label of humanely farmed may have a positive effect on peoples experience of eating.The paper was published Aug. 24 in the journal PLOS ONE.Original article on Live Science.Editors RecommendationsRattlesnake Sliders & Goat Penis: Photos of Exotic FoodScience You Can Eat: 10 Things You Didnt Know About FoodTip of the Tongue: The 7 (Other) Flavors Humans May TasteCopyright 2016 LiveScience, a Purch company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. -- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.
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