Social Status is Reflected on Taste of Food

According to Joshua Freedman and Dan Jurafsky, the author of "Authenticity in America Class Distinctions in Potato Chip Advertising", the theory that people's taste of food would reflect their different social and economic status was proved. More specifically, education and health are two key elements that loosely associate with people’s socioeconomic class identity.

In order to prove the connection between the education level and taste of potato chips in contemporary America, the length, complexity and negation of advertisement text on expensive potato chips package and inexpensive package are compared. The result turns out that the advertisement text on expensive potato chips package is much more longer, complicate. Also, comparison and negation are usually used on expensive potato chips package.

In addition, how the level of health associated with taste of food on potato chips package is compared and discussed by authors. For example, the commercials of expensive potato chips always emphasized those key words: 0 grams trans fat, healthier, no cholesterol, lowest sodium level, never fried, and so on. Because the audiences of the expensive potato chips commercial are peoples in high social status, as well as people who cares more about health.

In this article, I believe the most interesting analysis on potato chips advertisement is the comparison of the total words on expensive potato chips package and inexpensive potato chips package. “Expensive chips also have more words overall (142 words per bag, compared to 104 words per bag for the inexpensive chips).” I didn’t notice it in my daily life. However, I think it’s really interesting because the tiny change in the number of word on advertisement would reflect the linguistic level of customers, as well as the social status of customers.

I think the method of potato chips advertising analysis could be applied on bottled water. I used to find out that there are more descriptions on the headstream of the bottled water in expensive bottled water. Besides, the minerals, nutrients and taste of the bottled water would be illustrated on expensive bottled water. Moreover, the grammar sand words on expensive bottled water are much more completed than cheap bottled water.