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Lee: Association between Preferences of Salty Food and Acuity and Preferences of Taste of the Elderly People Living in Rural Area
Original Article

Korean Journal of Community Nutrition 2013; 18(3): 223-232.

Published online: 30 June 2013

DOI: https://doi.org/10.5720/kjcn.2013.18.3.223

Association between Preferences of Salty Food and Acuity and Preferences of Taste of the Elderly People Living in Rural Area

Mee Sook Lee

Department of Food and Nutrition, Hannam University, Daejeon, Korea.

Corresponding author: Mee Sook Lee, Department of Food and Nutrition, Hannam University, #461-6 Jeonmin-dong, Yuseong-gu, Daejeon 305-811, Korea. Tel: (042) 629-8794, Fax: (042) 629-8789, meesook@hnu.kr

Received 28 March 2013       Revised 14 May 2013       Accepted 14 May 2013

Copyright © 2013 The Korean Society of Community Nutrition

(open-access):

This is an Open-Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Abstract

The purpose of the study was to investigate the influence of salt (NaCl) recognition threshold and pleasant salt concentrations of Korean rural elderly subjects on preference of salty food as well as food group consumption patterns. The subjects were 213 elderly people (male 71 and female 142) over 65 and under 90 yr of age from Sunchang area. The higher values were found with male subjects in the areas of basic taste recognition threshold and pleasant concentration level of salt. The taste sensitivity scores of male subjects did not decrease with the increasing age, but female subjects exhibited a significant decrease with the age. The major determinant factor of salt preference of the elderly subjects in this study appeared to be personal pleasant concentration of salt rather than salt recognition threshold level and this trend was more evident in males than in females. The subject group of lower salt pleasant concentration i.e. consuming less salt showed the higher number of fruit and fruit juice intakes per week, and higher MNA (define this) scores were implying that they display more desirable nutritional status. Therefore, nutritional education focused on not only a variety of food consumption but also lowering pleasant salt concentration levels is advised to improve the quality of nutrition in the elderly.

Keywords: elderly, recognition threshold, pleasant salt concentration, salty food taste

Figures and Tables

Table 1
General characteristics of the subjects
kjcn-18-223-i001

1) p-value of the χ2-test

2) Mean ± SD

3) N (%)

***: p < 0.001

Table 2
Concentrations of recognition threshold of 4 basic taste qualities and pleasant salty taste by gender
kjcn-18-223-i002

1) p-value of the t-test, 2) Mean ± SD

**: p < 0.01, ***: p < 0.001

Table 3
Concentration of recognition thresholds of 4 basic taste qualities and pleasant salty taste by age groups
kjcn-18-223-i003

1) p-value of the t-test, 2) Mean ± SD

*: p < 0.05, **: p < 0.01, ***: p < 0.001

Table 4
Correlation coefficient among recognition threshold of tastes and pleasant salty taste adjusted by age and gender
kjcn-18-223-i004

1) Pearson's correlation coefficient

*: p < 0.05, **: p < 0.01, ***: p < 0.001

Table 5
Preferences of taste of food by gender
kjcn-18-223-i005

1) p-value of the χ2-test, 2) % of subjects

*: p < 0.05, **: p < 0.01

Table 6
Preferences of salty food by recognition threshold of salty taste group, pleasant salty taste group and gender
kjcn-18-223-i006

1) p-value of the χ2-test

2) Recognition threshold of NaCl group: low group: below mean value of recognition threshold, high group: above mean value of recognition threshold

3) % of subjects

4) Pleasant salty taste group: low group: below mean value of concentration of pleasant salty taste, high group: above mean value of concentration of pleasant salty taste

***: p < 0.001

Table 7
Education and food behaviors of subjects by recognition threshold of salty taste group and pleasant salty taste group
kjcn-18-223-i007

1) Recognition threshold of NaCl group: low group: below mean value of recognition threshold, high group: above mean value of recognition threshold

2) p-value of the t-test

3) Pleasant salty taste group: low group: below mean value of concentration of pleasant salty taste, high group: above mean value of concentration of pleasant salty taste

4) Mean ± SD

5) Brown (2008)

*: p < 0.05, **: p < 0.01, ***: p < 0.001

Notes

This work was supported by the 2012 Hannam University Research Fund.

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