Jekyll & Hy-PA: How to use psychology to make beer taste better
Teaching An Old Dog New Tricks
OK, so worked with the talented minds at BrewDog a few months back on designing their loyalty app experience. It’s been a fun ride (watch this space) but the best thing has been learning about the level of passion that goes into their beer. It’s infectious and got me thinking about one ingredient I don’t think they tap into as much as they could: applied psychology.
What if you could use psychology to design better beer?
“That Beer Tastes Spiky”
So before I introduce my split-personality beer (keep the drum roll simmering please), I need to give you a little primer on a couple of neat concepts in psychology: Synesthesia and Embodied Cognition.
Synesthesia (sin-uh s-thee-zhuh)
If I could have one psychological ‘disorder’, it would be Synesthesia. Hands down. In a nutshell, Synesthesia is where your senses are cross-wired causing a stimulus in one modality (sense) to trigger an experience in another.
Think: tasting shapes, hearing colours, smelling patterns and feeling sounds. No joke.
Sounds pretty awesome right? So the most common form of synesthesia is actually Number Synesthesia — where people experience certain numbers as always having a certain colour. This happens to about 1 in 2000 people — rare, but not that rare.
“A few years ago, I mentioned to a friend that I remembered phone numbers by their colour. He said “So you’re a synesthete!” I hadn’t heard of synesthesia (which means something close to ‘sense-fusion’) — I only knew that numbers seemed naturally to have colours: five is blue, two is green, three is red… And music has colours too: the key of C# minor is a sharp, tangy yellow, F major is a warm brown…” — Filmaker, Stephanie Morgenstern
Here’s the crazy bit — you already have a version of this condition.
I’d like to imagine that you’ve landed on an alien planet. Take a peek at the two organisms below. Which one is called Kiki and which one is called Bouba?
So the one on the left is Kiki and the one on the right is Bouba, right? You might say thinks like:
“Kiki sounds spikey doesn’t it?” or “Bouba sounds soft and round”
If you’re like 99% of the people across the world who answer this way, you’re in good company. But let’s just take a step back. This question has zero logic and you answered it with no sweat. What’s happening?
This simple thought experiment reveals something fundamental about how the topology of our brains influences how we create metaphor and abstract connection between topics. When we say the word “Kiki” in our minds, we active the the muscles we would use to say the word. This mimics us bearing our teeth with the “Kee” sound, this triggers concepts of biting….then we get to sharpness and now we can relate to the sharp edges of the shape.
So the big idea here is that concepts can be connected in systematic, predictable ways and this can be used to trigger certain ideas in our beer drinkers mind.
Embodied Cognition (Em-bod…you get it)
One of the major revolutions in psychology over the last decade has been the field of Embodied Cognition. In essense, this is the science of how we use our whole bodies to ‘think’ and process data, rather than just the grey matter inside our skulls.
One of my heroes on the subject is a gentleman called Charles Spence at the University of Oxford. One of his areas of focus is how we can trigger, and map, certain ‘cross-modal’ experiences. Helpfully, he’s done a fair bit of research into beer and I’m going to give you a whistle stop tour here.
So the big idea here is that we use inputs from different senses to set expectations of experience in other senses, and this can be used to actively change the expectations of our beer drinker in very systematic ways.
Introducing Jekyll & Hy-PA…
Jekyl & Hy-PA is an (imaginary) ale with a split personality. There are two ways to drink it and each tasting ritual changes the flavour experience.
Say hello to Dr Jekyll.
“The bartender hands you a solid aluminium beer mat. It feels robust but you notice that the edges are smooth and sharp. Engraved in is the surface is a simple outline of a pineapple. The beer mat is cold to the touch…”
There are studies that show that the weight of cutlery increases the perceived quality of food. We’re applying the concept to the beer mat to set expectations right from the start.
“The barman pops open a green bottle, with a vibrant green label, and starts to pour…”
Other studies show that the graphic design on the beer label influences taste expectations (and subsequently perceived taste experience). In one study green labels tended to bring about ratings of more citrus/fruity notes to the beer.
“He places a hyper-curved, almost bowl-shaped glass down on your beer mat and fills the glass. As you pick up the glass you notice that it fills your palm…”
People have studied the impact of wine glass shape on flavour experience but fewer have studied the impact of beer glass shape. Our man, Charles Spence & Friends, investigated and found that people tended to view beer from curved glasses as being fruitier.
“Before you take your first gulp, you notice the background music, an upbeat, flute-lead soundtrack plays as your take your first satisfying sup…”
So there’s also some odd research that shows that people associate bitter with lower tones and sweeter beers with higher pitched tones. We’re going to prime our drinker using a pitched up soundtrack.
The verdict?
Now the research suggests, you’ll be more likely to describe this beer as light, refreshing, zippy, floral, with acidic citrus notes and an altogether more fruity finish. Why is this? Because every cue has engineered that expectation, and that expectation has created a lens that changes how you process the sensory data. Let’s flip things around for the second act.
Introducing Mr Hyde — same beer, different ritual.
“So for your second pass at our imaginary ale you’ll be handed a weighted leather beer mat. You notice it’s weight and your fingertips register the smooth texture of the soft leather. Embossed in is the surface is a simple outline of a fireplace. The leather feels warm to the touch.
The barman opens a brown bottle, with a warm ochre label. He places a traditional pint glass on top of the leather beer mat and slowly pours.
Before you take your first gulp, you notice the background music, a laid-back jazzy blend of tuba and cello. You take your first taste.”
The verdict?
Now the odds are you’re going to remark on the beers depth of flavour. It’s richness, its full-bodied experience. You’ll probably throw in ‘hoppy’ for good measure. Why? Because every sensory cue you’ve had up to this point have created an expectation of how that beer is going to taste when it hits your tongue.
So what does all this mean?
We use our senses to form expectations, and these shape how we gather data to update our mental model. The result is that our subjective experience tends to align to our expectations, because we seek out data to support it. Once you know this, you can start having fun playing with expectations to engineer better experiences.
We all have some level of sensory cross-wiring and what Charles Spence is establishing is the psycho-physics that make some of these relationships happen in quite stable, predictable ways.
The question is, how might you use sensory cues to set customer expectations?
