Program Book - Master Brewers Association of the Americas

I-13
New aspect of beer evaluation by kansei engineering
SHIGEKI ARAKI (1), Hidetoshi Kojima (1), Hirotaka Kaneda (2),
Youichi Tsuchiya (1), Katsuaki Maeda (1), Toyohiko Hayashi (3),
Junji Watari (1)
(1) Sapporo Breweries Ltd., Shizuoka, Japan; (2) Sapporo Breweries
Ltd., Tokyo, Japan; (3) Niigata University, Niigata, Japan
Although Japan consumed over 6 billion liters of beer products
in 2007, the consumption has not showed a tendency to rise in
recent years. There are many commercial brands of beer among
three categories (beer, happoshu, and beers of a third category),
and many new products have been actively introduced to the
market in Japan, as brewers have striven to develop new products
to fit customer demand. Therefore, we needed to find solutions
for individual customer requirements. “Kansei” means human
feeling or image in Japanese, and kansei engineering is a method
for translating subjective impressions into objective criteria. Kansei
engineering extends over the humanities, social science and natural
science. We applied this technique to the evaluation of beer flavor
and the development of products based upon consumer feelings.
This study was aimed at demonstrating the importance of the
swallowing motion and human emotion in terms of beer preference.
1) Swallowing motion—smooth swallowing is a key factor for beer
drinkability. Swallowing is a serial movement of the mouth and
throat in order to transfer a food or beverage from the oral cavity to
the stomach, which is achieved by the coordinative activities of the
pharyngeal muscles. Along with this movement, the larynx pumps
up and down. In order to analyze the beer drinking motion exactly,
we measured the larynx motion via an electromyogram (EMG) of
suprahyoid musculature and swallowing sound using a non-invasive
biometric system. Analytic results of the parameters, such as the
period of larynx heave, correlated with the sensory evaluation,
suggesting that our biometric system could objectively evaluate
throat sensations during the consumption of beer. 2) Human
emotion—certain aromas are known to change one’s emotions.
Psychological conditions, such as comfort, have been estimated
on the basis of fluctuation in brain waves. Spectrum information
concerning the frequency fluctuation of alpha-waves is related to
the psychologically evaluated values of positive/negative moods.
In the meantime, the alleviation of stress and changes in human
mood during the smelling of beer aroma were investigated using a
measurement system for human brain waves. The aroma of beers,
namely that characterized by ester or hop flavors, had a relaxing
effect on humans. It was expected that ester and hop flavors in beer
would contribute to enhanced feelings of relaxation while drinking
beer. Kansei engineering is a relatively new and effective set of tools
for research to concretely determine the feelings evoked by beer
products. In the future, a new approach using kansei engineering
will be able to eliminate the gap between the actual feeling of the
consumer, the target feeling, and the ambiguity of feeling caused by
the individual character of the consumer.
Shigeki Araki is a manager of Frontier Laboratories, Sapporo
Breweries, Ltd., Japan. He graduated from Osaka University
in 1988 with a M.S.. degree and joined Sapporo Breweries, Ltd.
as a researcher in the Brewing Research Laboratories, where he
was engaged in research on beer quality. In 2003, he moved as a
manager to the Food Production Department in the Gunma Brewery.
From 2004 to 2006, he studied food function and chemistry as
lead biochemist in the Bioresources Research and Development
Laboratories and in 2006, he transferred to his present section.
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