Person
Charles Spence
Researcher; Oxford University; author, Sensehacking
Oxford University experimental psychologist specializing in multisensory perception — how sight, sound, smell, and touch combine (and can be deliberately engineered) to shape taste, judgment, and behavior. Author of Sensehacking. Not interviewed directly on the podcast; cited extensively via his book and a Nudgestock conference talk. Advised Cadbury that rounding a chocolate bar's shape would make it taste sweeter via shape-sound symbolism (see Cadbury Dairy Milk Rounded-Bar Taste Case). Documents how car and vacuum-cleaner engine sound is deliberately amplified or muted to change perceived speed and power, how synthetic scents (new-car smell, coffee, melon) are used to shift perception and sales, and how red cars are perceived as faster and louder than other colors (see Multisensory Perception (Sensehacking)).
Discussed in
- Episode 260 — 260-how-sights-smells-and-sounds-alter-what-you-buy