Association of Salty and Sweet Taste Recognition with Food Reward and Subjective Control of Eating Behavior

Sweet and salty tastes are highly palatable and drive food consumption and potentially uncontrolled eating, but it remains unresolved whether the ability to recognize sweet and salty affects food reward and uncontrolled eating. We investigate the association of sweet and salty taste recognition with liking and wanting and uncontrolled eating. Thirty-eight, mainly female (68%) participants of the Obese Taste Bud study, between 22 and 67 years old, with a median BMI of 25.74 kg/m² (interquartile range: 9.78 kg/m²) completed a taste test, the Leeds Food Preference Questionnaire to assess food reward, the Power of Food Scale (PFS) and the Three-Factor Eating Questionnaire to assess different aspects of uncontrolled eating. Better salty taste recognition predicted greater implicit wanting for high-fat savory foods (β = 0.428, <i>p</i> = 0.008) and higher PFS total (β = 0.315; <i>p</i> = 0.004) and PFS present subscale scores (β = 0.494, <i>p</i> = 0.002). While neither sweet nor salty taste recognition differed between lean individuals and individuals with obesity, those with greater trait uncontrolled eating showed significantly better salty taste recognition (U = 249.0; <i>p</i> = 0.009). Sweet taste recognition did not associate with food reward or uncontrolled eating. Better salty but not sweet taste recognition associates with a greater motivation for, but not liking of, particularly savory high-fat foods and further relates to greater loss of control over eating. Salty taste perception, with taste recognition in particular, may comprise a target to modulate food reward and uncontrolled eating.