Feeding and Evolution

Eating Behaviour – Neophobia and Taste Aversion

In this course, Professor Dominic Dwyer (Cardiff University) explores neophobia and taste aversion. In the first lecture, we think about the evolutionary background of feeding, including the reasons behind our preferences and avoidances for particular tastes. In the second lecture, we think about neophobia and its evolutionary function which stops the ingestion of large quantities of potentially unsafe substances. In the third lecture, we think about the classic understanding of taste aversion as a specialised function to enable the rapid learning of taste and illness pairings. Next, we think about some modern research which proposes that rapid learning is enabled more so by the ‘fit’ of the stimulus, in factors such as the length of time the experience lasts. In the fifth and final lecture, we think about the overall evolutionary functions that each of these taste and food related adaptations provide.

Feeding and Evolution

In this lecture, we think about the evolutionary background of feeding, focusing in particular on: (i) the importance of getting feeding ‘right’ due to the dangers, particularly as an omnivorous species, that humans face from undereating or eating the wrong things; (ii) the evolutionary reasons behind our preferences for sweet, salty and fatty tastes; (iii) the evolutionary reasons behind our innate avoidance of bitter and sour tastes, linked to poisonous and spoiled foods creating these tastes; (iv) the application of these taste preferences by food manufacturers to make their products more desirable.