Yellow Froot Loops
My only A-grade in university was in Biomechanical Engineering and it was taught by Dr. Tofy Mussivand. In one lecture, to illustrate how our sensory system can be manipulated, he asked us to visualize a slide of lemon and then us putting it in our mouths and chewing on it.
Many of our faces convulsed as we anticipated the sourness of the lemon on our tongues, the citrus juice flowing. I could even taste it.
It turns out different Froot Loops colors all taste the same. There is no difference. As Toucan Sam would say, “follow your nose”. Blindfolded, you can’t tell them alike and they have a general fruit-like taste but on seeing them, we anticipate a particular flavour.
We often use shortcuts to understand the world around us. Tasting with our eyes is one of those effects that might have had half a billion years of evolution. We can use that bias in our design work.
Interestingly, another bias associated with Froot Loops is the Mandela Effect or False Memory. Remember when they were called Fruit Loops? They never were. It turns out many people can have false memories of certain events, leading some to think of this as proof of multiple timelines of reality or glitches in the matrix. Probably best to be skeptical.
