Check-if-apply approach for consumers and utilities to communicate about drinking water aesthetics quality

Renata C V Carneiro; Chunmiao Wang; Jiawei Yu; Sean F O'Keefe; Susan E Duncan; Conor D Gallagher; Gary A Burlingame; Andrea M Dietrich

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.141776

Check-if-apply approach for consumers and utilities to communicate about drinking water aesthetics quality

Sci Total Environ. 2021 Jan 20:753:141776. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.141776. Epub 2020 Aug 18.

Authors

Renata C V Carneiro¹, Chunmiao Wang², Jiawei Yu³, Sean F O'Keefe⁴, Susan E Duncan⁵, Conor D Gallagher⁶, Gary A Burlingame⁷, Andrea M Dietrich⁸

Affiliations

¹ Food Science and Technology, Virginia Tech, 1230 Washington Street SW, 402 HABB1, Blacksburg, VA 24061, United States. Electronic address: rcvc@vt.edu.
² Key Laboratory of Drinking Water Science and Technology, Research Center for Eco-environmental Sciences, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, 18 Shuangqing Road, Haidian District, Beijing 100085, China. Electronic address: cmwang@rcees.ac.cn.
³ Key Laboratory of Drinking Water Science and Technology, Research Center for Eco-environmental Sciences, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, 18 Shuangqing Road, Haidian District, Beijing 100085, China. Electronic address: jwyu@rcees.ac.cn.
⁴ Food Science and Technology, Virginia Tech, 1230 Washington Street SW, 402 HABB1, Blacksburg, VA 24061, United States. Electronic address: okeefes@vt.edu.
⁵ Food Science and Technology, Virginia Tech, 1230 Washington Street SW, 402 HABB1, Blacksburg, VA 24061, United States. Electronic address: duncans@vt.edu.
⁶ Computer Science, Virginia Tech, 220 Hancock Hall, 490 Old Turner Street, Blacksburg, VA 24061, United States. Electronic address: conorg93@vt.edu.
⁷ Bureau of Laboratory Services, Philadelphia Water Department, 1500 E. Hunting Park Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19124, United States. Electronic address: Gary.Burlingame@phila.gov.
⁸ Civil and Environmental Engineering, Virginia Tech, 418 Durham Hall, 1145 Perry Street, MC 0246, Blacksburg, VA 24061, United States. Electronic address: andread@vt.edu.

PMID: 32911162
DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.141776

Abstract

Globally, consumers judge their drinking water through its aesthetic qualities because tastes, odors, and appearances are readily detectable by untrained consumers. Consumer feedback is critical to the water industry for efficient resolution of aesthetic water quality issues, although consumer descriptions of taste and odor issues can sometimes be unfocused or confusing. A user-friendly approach can facilitate consumer communications to utilities in the challenging task of describing drinking water taste and odor issues. The purpose of this study was to develop a list of taste and odor descriptors and test a novel "check-if-apply" approach to describe drinking water quality. The final list contained 28 individual and/or groups of descriptors. 75 participants tested water samples impacted by various tastants or odorants: duplicate samples of chloraminated tap water, tap water with heptanal, tap water with 2-methylisoborneol (MIB), tap water with NaCl, bottled water, and bottled water with CuSO₄. Participants used a 9-point hedonic scale (1 = 'dislike extremely'; 9 = 'like extremely') to rate overall liking of each sample, and they used the check-if-apply list to describe the taste or odor. Participants also answered a brief questionnaire and used a 5-point scale (1 = 'very difficult'; 5 = 'very easy') to evaluate their experience using the check-if-apply list. Significant differences were observed in acceptability and sensory profile of samples (p-value <0.05). Tap water with MIB had the lowest acceptability mean score (3.43 ± 1.74), while flavorless bottled water had the highest acceptability mean score (6.23 ± 1.47). 'Salty', 'metallic', 'chemical' and 'musty/earthy' were the dominant descriptors for NaCl, CuSO_4, heptanal, and MIB, respectively. Most participants (81%) found the check-if-apply list as 'somewhat easy' to 'very easy' to use (mean = 3.44 ± 1.07) and suggested it as a user-friendly lexicon for consumers and utilities to communicate about water quality.

Keywords: Aesthetics; Communication; Consumers; Drinking water; Odor; Taste.

MeSH terms

Drinking Water* / analysis
Esthetics
Humans
Odorants / analysis
Taste
Water Quality

Substances

Drinking Water