Those of us who deal with pasta from morning to night already knew this, but now we can say it’s official. Research has proven the existence of an emotional and neurophysiological mechanism underlying the psychological and physical well-being experienced when eating a plate of pasta.
The study was conducted by the Behaviour & Brain Lab at the IULM Free University of Languages and Communication. This is the first time that scientific research has investigated the emotional-gratification sphere to understand how, how much and why we are happy when we eat a plate of pasta.
The research was conducted on a representative sample of 40 pasta lovers using four different study techniques that allowed for an in-depth examination of various aspects of the relationship between the subjects and this food:
– neuroanalysis, to understand emotional and cognitive activation states during tasting;
– bioanalysis, which uses heart rate and micro-sweating to analyse the level of physiological and emotional activation in response to stimuli;
– the face reader, which uses face coding to analyse changes in micro-expressions on the face in response to a stimulus;
– a questionnaire to process the participants’ rational experiences and compare them with the findings from the neurophysiological data.
The survey considered the type of emotional reaction and the relative degree of involvement achieved at the time of tasting in comparison to some favourite activities (such as listening to music, or watching the Olympics, a football match or tennis).
The study confirms that eating pasta induces a positive emotional-cognitive state with results equal to, if not superior to, those recorded with music and sport. The four parameters analysed also show that the emotional experience of tasting one’s favourite pasta is equal to that generated by the recollection of happy memories!
