2011 Volume 15 Issue 2 Pages 156-164
The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of sensory information in the anticipatory stage of feeding on lip closing pressure during food capturing.
The subjects were 20 healthy young adults (10 males: 23.3±2.2 years of age, 10 females: 23.5±3.2 years of age).
Soft jelly-type food was fed to them in the following four manners: (1) with their eyes closed and being given no information about the food, (2) with their eyes closed and being told what they were about to eat, (3) with their eyes open and being told what they were about to eat, and (4) self feeding with their eyes open and being told what they were about to eat. Each action was performed three times and the food was chosen randomly from eight sorts having different tastes but similar textures.
A strain gauge transducer was embedded in the feeding spoon in advance, and lip closing pressure during food capturing was measured and recorded. Both the average and relative standard deviation of strength, duration, and waveform of the lip closing pressure were analyzed and compared between the four conditions.
The results showed that:
1）The pressure strength showed no significant difference between the four conditions, but the male subjects tended to show a larger pressure in self feeding.
2）The duration of the pressure was significantly longer when subjects had no visual information.
3）The personal relative standard deviation of the pressure strength was large when male subjects had no information or when female subjects fed themselves.
4）The personal relative standard deviation of the pressure duration showed no significant difference between the four conditions.
5）Without visual information, the waveform tended to have two peaks, one of which was smaller and appeared before the main peak.
These experiment results suggested that sensory information affects the lip pressure by altering the duration, stability, and style of the pressure.
