CASS has been a pioneer for the research of fat taste in recent years. We have explored how fat taste might influence our eating habits, food preferences and body mass. In 2018, we published findings in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition on the effect of diet and genes on fat taste sensitivity. The study concluded that what we eat is more likely to determine how sensitive we are to fat taste rather than our genes, suggesting that we can change how we perceive fat taste with a little change to our diet. In short, consuming a low-fat diet for at least 4 weeks will increase your sensitivity to fat taste, subsequently making you feel fuller after eating fatty foods.
Our research in this area has gained interest nationally and globally, including articles in The Age, and ABC News.
You can also listen to Professor Russell Keast and PhD candidate Andrew Costanzo on ABC News (19 January 2016) discussing how their research found that high fat diets change taste buds, which may lead to overeating.
