O efeito da música na percepção, aceitação e emoção de consumidores de cafés: um estudo envolvendo a experiência sensorial

Abstract

Food and beverage consumption has increasingly been understood as a multisensory experience in which environmental stimuli play a relevant role in shaping perception, emotions, and consumer responses. In this context, music stands out as a sensory stimulus capable of modulating emotional states, directing attention, and influencing the consumption experience. In the specialty coffee segment, characterized by the appreciation of sensory quality, product origin, and the tasting experience, understanding the role of music becomes especially pertinent. Thus, the objective of this study was to analyze the effect of music on the perception, acceptance, and emotions of coffee consumers. A mixed-methods approach was adopted, combining a quantitative experimental design with qualitative investigation. The quantitative stage involved the application of Temporal Dominance of Sensations (TDS) to assess sensory perception, Check-All-That-Apply (CATA) to measure evoked emotions, and a nine-point hedonic scale to analyze acceptance of both the coffee and the music. The experiment was conducted under three auditory conditions: no music, ambient music, and music played through headphones. Quantitative data were analyzed using analyses of variance (ANOVA). The qualitative stage consisted of in-depth interviews, analyzed using Content Analysis, allowing for a deeper exploration of the meanings attributed by participants to the consumption experience under different auditory stimuli. The results indicated that music did not significantly alter overall coffee acceptance; however, it modulated perceptual dynamics over time, promoting the softening of attributes such as bitterness and acidity and the emergence of notes associated with sweetness, especially under the headphone music condition. In the emotional domain, statistically significant differences were observed for positive-valence emotions, such as well-being, relaxation, ease, and sociability, with a progressive increase in mean scores from the no-music condition to ambient music and then to headphone music. Qualitative data reinforced these findings, showing that music contributes to states of calmness, attention, and greater engagement with the experience. The integration of results was interpreted in light of the S-O-R (Stimulus–Organism–Response) Theory, considering music as an environmental stimulus, perceptual and emotional processes as internal organism states, and acceptance evaluations as behavioral responses. It is concluded that music acts as a relevant sensory and emotional modulator in the specialty coffee consumption experience, although its effects manifest partially and are dependent on context and mode of sound reproduction.