I'm not sure I can explain it very well, but it's simply the "acquired" but you mentioned already. Through repeated exposure, you can make yourself come to like or accept a particular taste you didn't like before.

Traditionally "bad" tasting things like coffee and beer are a good example I think. At first, hoppy or bitter, we don't like it, but the more it is tried, and the different types we try, the more flavours we learn to detect and appreciate, going back to the original, you may find you taste something completely different, or you just started on something bad in the first place.

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Let's limit the answer to food/drink taste, which is actually more smell than taste. The brain is always trying to figure out if something in the mouth is good nutritious food or bad poison. In general, bitter and decomposed or moldy things=bad, sweet/salty/fatty/proteiny things=good, and sour is variable. The first time you eat something, you have limited information beyond basic patterns. Young babies need lots of nutrition and have parents to help, so they like all kinds of things, but toddlers are capable of finding something toxic, so they get pickier.

So, the first time you try coffee, your brain's reaction is likely "this is very strongly flavored and bitter, probably poison." Try it a few more times, and your brain gets used to it, confirms nothing bad was associated with it last time, and may start to associate it with positives like mild stimulation. Conversely, if you throw up after eating a food you used to like, it may be a while before you regain your desire for it--now your brain has evidence it was poison and should be avoided.

Is there research into the idea that there are any tastes that can't be acquired with repeated exposure over time? I wouldn't be surprised if there weren't.

On the vomiting with a food you used to like, when I was a kid I'd had a bunch of chocolate in the morning, like alot of chocolate, turns out I'd gotten food poisoning the night before and spent the entire day vomiting up chocolate and shitting myself, once you've tasted partly digested chocolate mixed with bile lemme tell you chocolate loses most of its appeal.

Strawberry ice cream for me. It's been over 35 years and I still don't like it.

Oh I'd cry, I love strawberry icecream

I like actual strawberries with vanilla ice cream, but that's as far as I'll go. My husband likes strawberry shakes and I tried one a few years ago to see how I felt about it. Still no thank you.

For similar reasons, I can’t even be in the same room as someone eating mussels.

That explains why I can't drink rum and coke anymore....

Bachelor parties man

I got food poisoning after eating lemon meringue pie in 2003. I think in a few years I may be ready to order it again.

I got food poisoning after eating lemon meringue pie in 2003. I think in a few years I may be ready to order it again.

I was given fish sticks as a kid, wasn't told what they were. My house never ate fish, so it definitely had to be fucked up poison chicken tenders.

It took 30 years and marrying into a very fish eating culture to learn to like the taste.

To be fair to your brain, alcohol is a bad poison.

When I was 18 months old I was given some turkey that I ended up getting food poisoning from. It was so bad I was throwing up bile and they had to take me to the ER. I don’t remember it thank god.

It took me years to be able to eat turkey again. Even at 32 I’m still cautious when it comes to lunch meat and poultry, and I’m pretty sure that I have some degree of emetophobia from the situation.

There's not really something that separates acquired tastes from non acquired tastes. There's foods or drinks that are almost universally loved that some people just don't like. It mostly has to do with a diversified palate. If you eat something that's very different from everything else you've ever tasted, chances are you won't like it the first time. It's why we "acquire tastes" as we grow older.

Sounds like you'll have to avoid the entire country of Belgium for the rest of your life.

There were a number of years in my youth where Vodka smelled like straight up vomit to me, and I know it was entirely psychological.

From the word itself, acquired meaning you've exposed your taste to that food many times, you've grown used to it. I remember not liking coffee that much in the beginning, but overtime I try to tweak it a bit and add something I like to the coffee to make is taste bearable for me like more sugar or cream. Eventually my taste got used to it that I started adding less sugar and cream.

Friends and family who are educated, employed or experienced with child development and kids in general have said it takes 7 to 10 tries to get a youngster to start eating something new. That's got to translate to adults. Except we don't have someone urging us to just have three more bites of tuna casserole or broccoli and cheese.

Chicken alfredo for me. Fancy Shmancy restaurant in NY. WORST food poisoning ever had in my life. Over 10+ years and have never had it again.

Sambuca is a big no no. Automatic gag reflexes even if I smell it. Worst drunk of my life, probably 15-20 years ago.

I agree completely, and I think it actually should be called an "aquired scent" or "aquired flavor" rather than taste. Most people react first to the appearance of the food, then scent of a food (although those two sensory inputs are probably happening at the same time), then the mouth-feel and temperature, and lastely the actual taste.

Yeah I couldn't drink Ribena for about 5 years after my little sister vomited up a blackcurrent squash/sour milk hybrid all over our sofa and it stank of it for about a month.

Yo dude same. Is 25 years I cannot even smell it,same with anice or everything associated. Mint and liquirice are fine!

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I got food poisoning a year or so back and I threw up something the color of Gatorade (almost neon yellow). I think it was bile but I really did not expect that color to come out of me.

Sounds like it was bile. Usually if you’re throwing that up, you don’t have any food left in there but the body’s still trying to get rid of the pathogen.