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Hard (alcoholic) ciders have grown rapidly since the early 2000s, but unlike beer and wine, there is limited scholarly research on their sensory attributes. The purpose of this study was to categorize and describe sensory and visual packaging and label attributes of ciders made in Virginia, United States using a labeled, free sorting task (a rapid sensory analysis method) with untrained panelists. In Study 1, N 1 = 49 panelists tasted and sorted K = 18 ciders into groups and labeled their groups. Then visually for Study 2, a second group of panelists (N 2 = 61) sorted "photo sheets" of packaging and labels for the same K = 18 ciders by two separate tasks: According to how they expected the cider to taste; and What occasion they would be most inclined to consume the cider at. Classical text analysis was used to analyze descriptors from both the sensory and visual free sorting tasks, and the terms were projected onto their respective compromise similarity maps that were produced using DISTATIS. Subjects identified and described distinct sensory styles and attributes among the evaluated ciders; however, descriptions provided by producers on their labels did not align well with panelist experienced sensory attributes. Consistent sorting patterns from the photo sheets emerged—providing a first look into how ciders might be valued based on packaging and labels alone. The results of this research will help cider producers develop favorable products that will satisfy consumer expectations and encourage repeat purchase. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Flavored rapeseed oil (FRO) is a typical hot‐pressed oil and is widely consumed in China due to its strong characteristic flavor and intensive color. In this study, volatile profiles of 33 representative commercial rapeseed oils in China are characterized by gas chromatography‐mass spectrometry (GC‐MS) and flash gas chromatography (GC) electronic nose system. 51 volatile compounds are identified and the nitriles (methallyl cyanide and 5‐cyano‐1‐pentene), aldehydes (nonanal, 3‐furaldehyde, and 5‐methyl‐2‐furancarboxaldehyde), alcohols (1,5‐hexadien‐3‐ol, 2‐furanmethanol, and phenylethyl alcohol), and pyrazines (2,5‐dimethyl‐pyrazine and 2,6‐dimethyl‐pyrazine) are the major volatile compounds in FROs. Glucosinolate degradation products account for the highest proportion of these volatiles, which are found to have a positive correlation with the erucic acid content (R2 = 0.796, p < 0.01). FRO from Sichuan province in the southwest of China can be characterized by the obvious distinctions in flash GC electronic nose combined with principal component analysis, which indicates that the flash GC electronic nose can be used as a promising method to identify the origins of FRO. Practical Applications: This work is helpful for expanding the knowledge of volatiles of commercial flavored rapeseed oil. The data can also serve as a basis for the quality assessment of hot‐pressed rapeseed oil. Meanwhile, the flash GC electronic nose combined with principal component analysis can be used as a promising method for the classification of flavor rapeseed oil production areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Sensory categorization may occur in a hierarchical manner. • Panellists across demographic groups all categorized milk based on sugar content. • Plant-based milks and dairy milks were consistently categorized separately. • Attitudes towards creaminess, nutrition, and price affect categorization. Categories allow humans to anticipate sensory properties of a food before eating it. Placement of foods into different categories has implications for marketing and food product development. Current research in food categorization has focused on card sorting methods using pictures or words, but our understanding of sensory-based food categorization and its potential variability across individuals remains limited. The purpose of this study was to determine if a person's experiences and habits affect the way they categorize foods in the category of milk and milk alternatives. In this two-part study, focus groups were first conducted with 34 participants to determine how usage and important attributes of milk differed across diet demographic groups. Then, the influence of demographics on categorization was examined using agglomerative free sorting in which 69 panellists sorted 24 distinct milk alternative products and 31 panellists sorted 30 milk and milk alternative products. The results from a DISTATIS analysis revealed that sugar content was a primary factor in categorization across all demographic groups, indicating a potential universal hierarchical categorization process. When removing sugar content as a factor, differences in categorization were related to attitudes towards creaminess, nutrition, price, colour, and usage of milk in drinks. These insights trigger new questions about what other attributes would drive categorization when removing sugar as a factor and how sugar content would affect categorization of solid foods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • The focus is on the segmentation of the subjects participating to projective mapping or free sorting tasks. • A strategy of setting aside atypical subjects in the course of the segmentation is introduced. • The homogeneity of the clusters is improved by setting aside atypical subjects. Abstract A method of clustering a collection of datasets measured on the same individuals, called CLUSTATIS, was introduced and applied to the segmentation of the subjects participating in a projective mapping experiment or a free sorting task. A refinement of this method of clustering is proposed. It consists in segmenting the subjects while discarding those subjects who can be considered as atypical because they do not fit to the pattern of any cluster. This strategy of analysis requires the determination of a threshold parameter that delineates the boundary between the main clusters and the noise cluster that contains the atypical subjects. An appropriate selection of this parameter is proposed. The general strategy of analysis is illustrated on the basis of a simulation study and data from projective mapping and free sorting experiments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Several statistical procedures have been proposed for the analysis of the data from a free sorting task. A straightforward strategy of analysis based on correspondence analysis and cluster analysis performed on the co-occurrence matrix is proposed herein. More specifically, two situations are considered depending on whether the aim is to depict the relationships among the stimuli or to investigate the agreement among the subjects. The approach of analysis is illustrated on the basis of free sorting data characterizing chocolate products. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The production process of South African bottle-fermented sparkling wine, the Méthode Cap Classique (MCC), follows the traditional French method (méthode champenoise), although each cellar has its own unique additions to the method. South African winemakers use different techniques and blends to achieve their award-winning MCCs, but there have not been many scientific investigations of the science behind these wines. This project is one of the first scientific studies on MCC. MCC wines were made using Chardonnay and Pinot Noir grapes harvested over two vintages (2014 and 2015) from two regions (Robertson and Darling) and stored at 0°C, 10°C, 25°C and 30°C before processing. The study was aimed at investigating the effect of grape storage temperature on the sensory characteristics of MCCs. The aroma and taste of the final nine-month old MCCs were evaluated, with each region analysed separately. The study showed a grouping of the MCCs according to temperature treatments for both vintages. There were vintage differences in terms of the attributes cited and the frequency of citations. Based on the frequency of citation, the MCCs made 2014 from grapes stored at 0°C and 10°C were described by the judges as having a fruity, fresh and crisp aroma, whilst those made from grapes stored at 25°C and 30°C were described as having oxidised fruit, volatile acidity and solvent-like aromas. The judges perceived less oxidation and volatile acidity (VA) (in terms of the frequency of citation) in the aroma of the 2015 MCCs, although treatments at higher temperatures were still associated with less desirable attributes compared to treatments at lower temperature. This study shown that the temperature of the grape at the time of processing has a significant effect on the aroma of MCCs aged nine months, and not so much of an effect on the taste. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a new variant of the free sorting method developed to analyze the relationship between dried sourdough (DSD) and corresponding DSD-bread (bread) odors. The comparison of DSD and bread sensory characteristics is complicated due to their specific features (for example, acidity for DSD and a characteristic 'baked bread' aroma for breads). To analyze them at the same time, this study introduces a new variant of the free sorting method, which adds an association task between DSD and bread after those of free sorting and verbalization. This separation makes it possible to change the product between tasks. It was applied to study the impact of 6 European commercial DSDs on their related DSD-bread. According to our results, this methodology enabled an association between different kinds of products and thus underlined the relationship between them. Moreover, as this methodology contains a verbalization task, it provides product descriptions. Compared with the standard free sorting method, free sorting with an association task gives the distance (i) between DSDs, (ii) between breads, and (iii) between DSDs and breads. The separation of product assessment through sorting and association avoids the separation of products according to their category (DSD or bread). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• A lexicon of 96 wine-odor terms was structured using a sorting task. • An additive tree provided a comprehensive representation of the large set of objects. • An original partitioning technique was used to identify clusters from the tree structure. • The stability of clusters was evaluated with cohesion and isolation criteria by bootstrapping. In the field of clustering techniques, little attention has been paid to the recovery of a set of clusters from the structure of an additive tree. To bridge this gap, this work presents an original partitioning technique which aims to reveal clusters from an additive tree that represents a large set of objects. Specifically, an algorithm that splits a tree into successive subtrees was developed, based on a ratio of the lengths of edges. The stability of the clusters obtained with this technique was then evaluated using measurements of cohesion and isolation that were generated using a bootstrapping strategy. Finally, the degree of association of each object to clusters was analyzed to gain insight into their internal structure. This analysis was performed on the results of a sorting task conducted by 156 subjects, who were asked to sort 96 terms associated with the odor of wine. The methodology developed in this paper represents an innovative way to highlight groups of terms within a large set of wine odor attributes, with the ultimate goal being to improve the structure of the lexicon. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Our initial aim in this study was to show that Western listeners can sort the music of 3 Western composers consistently on the basis of their compositional style. We found that they could, and proceeded to investigate what cues they might be using to accomplish that task, as well as whether their use of those cues was related to their level of musical training. In Experiment 1, we presented 21 excerpts from the keyboard music of Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven, each excerpt linked to an icon on the computer screen. Participants were to place the icons in different groups following the rule that the icons in one group could have been written by the same composer. First, they did a free sort in which they could form as many groups as they liked, and then we told them that there were just 3 composers, and they should make 3 groups in a constrained sort. In Experiment 1, the excerpts were produced with MIDI transcriptions of the scores, such that the composer's pitch and time information of the notes was preserved, but there was no variation in tempo, dynamics (loudness), or articulation (connectedness or separateness of notes in time). In spite of this simplification, listeners succeeded in clearly differentiating the composers in the constrained sort. In Experiment 2, we used more natural stimuli, 36 excerpts taken from recordings of the 3 composers by 4 pianists who had recorded substantial amounts of each: Arrau, Barenboim, Pirès, and Richter. Here, the stimuli included all the expressive cues of a live performance, and in the constrained sort listeners were even better at categorizing the composers, with not very much difference between the categorizations of trained and untrained listeners. Their judgments were also strongly influenced by the pianists. Richter's performances of the 3 composers were clustered relatively close to the Mozart region of the solution, indicating their clarity and balance; in contrast, those of Barenboim were clustered in the Beethoven region, indicating their sumptuousness and passion. We used a relatively new approach to data analysis—DiSTATIS—which provided the possibility of projecting the sorting results viewed from various perspectives—composer, pianist, participant expertise—into the same space, giving a clearer picture of the results than a piecemeal account of those perspectives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• The STATIS method is applied to projective mapping and free sorting data. • A cluster analysis called CLUSTATIS for the clustering of multiblock data is introduced. • Application of CLUSTATIS to sensometrics are outlined. • Illustrations of CLUSTATIS on the basis of projective mapping and free sorting data are given. The STATIS method has been successfully applied to the analysis of sensory profiling data and other kinds data in sensometrics. We discuss its use and benefits and compare its outcomes to alternative methods for the analysis of multiblock data arising in situations such as projective mapping and free sorting experiments. More importantly, a method of clustering a collection of datasets measured on the same individuals, called CLUSTATIS, is introduced. It is based on the optimization of a criterion and consists in a hierarchical cluster analysis and a partitioning algorithm akin to the K-means algorithm. The procedure of analysis can be seen as an extension of the cluster analysis of variables around latent components (CLV, Vigneau & Qannari, 2003) to the case of blocks of variables. Alongside the determination of the clusters, a latent configuration is determined by the STATIS method. The interest of CLUSTATIS in sensometrics is discussed and illustrated on the basis of two case studies pertaining to the projective mapping also called Napping and the free sorting tasks, respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]