Confusion in the use of the taste adjectives ‘sour’ and ‘bitter’

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Abstract
Subjects from Britain and America were tested on their skill at applying the taste adjectives ‘sweet’, ‘sour’, ‘salty’, and ‘bitter’ to clearly distinguishable solutions of sucrose, citric acid, NaCl and quinine sulphate, respectively. The main error that occurred was calling citric acid ‘bitter’ while the tendency to call quinine sulphate ‘sour’ was not so common; this is the well known sour-bitter confusion. A sour-salty confusion was also noted as well as a tendency to call citric acid ‘sweet’. All these confusions were rectified by mere definition using standards. Skill at applying taste adjectives was not always found to be consistent over time. More errors occurred at lower solution concentrations, even though stimuli were clearly distinguishable; indistinguishability of stimuli may account for some confusions in other studies.

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