大象传媒

Humans have the potential to eat pretty much anything 鈥� but the reality is we don鈥檛. Wherever we live in the world, we eat just a small fraction of the foodstuffs available and show strong preferences for certain foods over others. Those preferences can change dramatically from person to person, or as the saying goes 鈥� one man鈥檚 meat is another man鈥檚 poison. Then at the extreme end of the spectrum you get so-called 鈥榝ussy eaters鈥� who reject so many foods that they are confined to beige diets of crisps, crackers and cereal.

So why do we show such different preferences for food? And why are some people fussier than others? That鈥檚 what CrowdScience listeners Orante Andrijauskaite in Germany and Anna Nicolaou in Belgium would like to know, and what Datshiane Navanayagam is off to find out.

She discovers how both biology and culture shape whether a food is disgusting or delicious and learns why we should stop giving children a hard time about finishing their dinner. She also learns how global cuisines evolved and what that can teach us about helping fussy eaters to overcome their food fears.

Presenter: Datshiane Navanayagam
Producer: Anna Lacey

(Photo: Fried Bugs in Bangkok night market. Credit: Getty Images)