A Classification of Foods by the Amount of Masticatory Action Involved

With a view to classifying. foods on the basis of the amount of masticatory acrequired, an attempt was made to correlate the properties ot different foods as shown by mechanical measurements with the amount of masticatory action involved as determined by means of an electromyogram. We obtained the following results: 1) We found an extremely high correlation (r =0.924) between the amount of masticatory action involved and the mechanical properties of our samples when these were expressed as values given by the formula: 1og (firmncss×cohcsiveness×strainess×10)We refer to this parameter as toughness. 2) We were then able to estimate the amount of activity necessary in actual mastication of various foods from our toughness values and other values obtained through texturometer readings, a procedure which we carriedout for 144 types of foods. 3) We were thus able to classify foods into ten levels according to masticatory action.