According to an experiment conducted by Valentin Skryabin, an addictologist at the Russian Medical Academy, stolen food tastes better. His experience would have in fact proven that, for two identical fries, one is systematically judged better than the other when it has been taken without permission. The taste would even be increased tenfold if the pilferage involved real risk-taking.
The Refractor journal details the content of this study: 120 adults were asked to evaluate identical portions of fries obtained in four different situations: their own portion, a fry received as a gift, a fry stolen without permission, or even in contexts mixing different levels of risk.
The results are clear: stolen fries are systematically described as crispier, saltier and simply better. Those obtained after taking a significant risk are judged to be nearly 40% better than the others, although they are nevertheless strictly identical.
According to Valentin Skryabin, three mechanisms simultaneously influence the perception of taste. The first is psychological resistance: the tendency of forbidden things to become more desirable simply because they are presented as forbidden. The second is physiological arousal: grabbing something you’re not supposed to pick up speeds up the heart rate and sharpens attention. This state clearly amplifies the sensations, the same amount of salt hits harder, the same crunch seems more satisfying.
The third is waiting: “We all internalize from childhood the idea that stolen food tastes better, and the brain is remarkably good at finding what it is looking for”analyzes Valentin Skryabin. “These explanations are not mutually exclusive, they likely all operate at the same time, reinforcing each other.”
The forbidden fry
The study, however, has important limitations. Participants were instructed to steal the fries, making it a symbolic transgression. Neither age nor gender would have had any influence on the results. As for the personality of the guinea pigs, the study did not include tools to formally measure it. It is therefore difficult to know whether individual traits such as a taste for risk play a role.
One factor, however, had a slight impact: hunger. Participants who were hungrier at the time of the experiment showed a slightly attenuated transgression effect, as if when the physiological need is strong, the context seems to matter less.
The study, deliberately homogeneous – fries, in a single session, in a single laboratory – does not allow us to conclude whether the effect applies to other foods, or to something other than food. The “forbidden fruit” effect runs through literature, from there Bible has The Divine Comedy of Dante, suggesting that restrictions amplify desire in many areas: consumer choices, access to information, romantic attraction.
Food nevertheless remains the ideal testing ground, precisely because we can standardize everything, same weight, same temperature, same preparation – something we cannot do with most other objects of desire.
Despite the apparent superficiality of this study, the underlying principle seems solid: “The brain assigns amplified hedonic value to contested or restricted experiences“, concludes Valentin Skryabin. A tasty way to remind you that taste is not only a matter of taste buds, but also of context, emotion and also sometimes… transgression.
