Does This Heart Really "Sour"?

The use of gustatory vocabulary to describe emotions is a common linguistic phenomenon.It metaphorically compares emotional experiences to gustatory sensations,with "sour" often conveying negative connotations such as sadness,pain,jealousy,and pettiness,as in "bitter-sweet," "acerbic," and "acidic." This kind of metaphor is based on the principle that different cognitive domains share similar embodied experiences.The physiological sense of taste is closely linked to emotional states,and the two share similar attributes,leading to a mapping between the two.Different tastes can have different effects on emotions.Based on existing research,sweet tastes are mainly associated with positive emotions,and traditional Chinese culture also links the five elements theory with the five flavors,colors,and emotions.After summarizing previous theories and empirical studies on color,taste,and their relationship to emotions,four experiments were designed to further explore the impact and regulatory effects of taste and color on emotions.Experiment 1 uses a behavioral experiment to investigate the pairing between taste and color.Thirty students from Chongqing Normal University participate in a two-factor withinsubjects experiment,with the independent variable being taste(sour or sweet)and color(green,red,yellow,white,or black)and the dependent variable being the frequency with which participants match taste and color.The experiment is conducted by presenting participants with a taste stimulus,and then asking them to judge the corresponding taste by pressing a button.Then,a color interface is presented,and participants are asked to indicate which color matches the taste stimulus they just experienced.The goal is to provide empirical support for the pairing of taste and color.Experiment 2 uses a PANAS questionnaire to investigate the impact of sour and sweet tastes on positive and negative emotions.Ninety students from the university participate in the experiment,and the independent variable is the taste(sour,sweet,or control group),while the dependent variable is the participants’ perception and liking of the different tastes,as well as their emotional state.Participants are asked to taste different beverages and report their actual feelings in the questionnaire.The aim is to explore the relationship between taste,liking,and emotional state.Experiment 3 is a within-subjects experiment with a single factor,investigating the effects of sour taste on taste perception,liking,and emotional state.Sixty students from the university participate,and the experiment involves asking participants to rate their current emotional state on a five-point scale before tasting a sour taste stimulus.They are then asked to taste different beverages and report their feelings and liking of the taste in the questionnaire.Finally,participants are shown an emotional video and asked to rate their emotional state before tasting the sour taste stimulus again and reporting their feelings and liking.The goal is to explore the impact of negative emotions on sour taste perception and liking.Experiment 4 is another within-subjects experiment,investigating the effects of different taste-color pairings on taste perception,liking,emotional state,and response to emotional stimuli.One hundred and fifty students from the university participate,and the experiment involves asking participants to rate their current emotional state before tasting different beverages that correspond to different taste-color pairings.Participants are then asked to report their feelings and liking of the taste in the questionnaire,as well as rate their emotional response to different stimuli.The goal is to explore the impact of taste-color pairings on negative emotions and how they are regulated.The following conclusions can be confirmed by the above four experiments:(1)The sour taste and sweetness match cyan and yellow respectively,which is in line with the assumption of the corresponding affiliation relationship of the five elements.(2)Significant disparities in the inclination of participants for various tastes were observed,with the sweet group exhibiting a significantly greater fondness than the sour.Moreover,there were noteworthy variations in emotional state;the sweet group had a greater proportion of positive emotions and a lesser amount of negative ones.The sour group had a higher proportion of negative emotions and lower positive emotions.(3)After the participants were induced by sad emotions,there were significant differences in the degree of taste preference before and after.After negative emotions were induced,the participants’ liking for sour taste was significantly lower than before the induction.(4)The acid-green group’s average score of emotional pictures was the least dissimilar between the mean and the standard values,with considerable disparities between the scores of each group.Conclusion There is a synesthetic relationship between sour taste and sweetness in the five flavors and cyan and yellow in the five colors.There is a two-way influence between taste perception and emotion;Color-matched acid-cyanine can enhance the regulation of negative emotions.