Why Can the Same Wine Sometimes Taste Better at a Higher Price?

If the same wine is presented at a low price and a high price, some people report enjoying the expensive-labelled glass more. This need not be an attempt to please the experimenter, nor merely a story invented afterwards. Tasting is not a raw upload from the taste buds. The brain combines aroma, texture, context and expectation into a single experience. Price is often used as a cue to quality, so the expectation that something ought to be better can redirect attention and alter judgements of pleasure.

In a 2008 experiment, participants tasted wines in an MRI scanner while being told different prices, even when the wine was actually the same. A higher stated price increased pleasantness ratings and was accompanied by changes in medial orbitofrontal cortex activity. This supports the idea of a “marketing placebo effect”, but the brain activity did not measure objective wine quality; it reflected value processing within the experience.

Crucially, the effect is not robust in every setting. Six studies published in 2023, involving 2,842 participants, found that higher prices reliably raised expectations of quality and liking before consumption, but did not consistently raise perceived quality or liking after people tried the products. Product type, task, experience and experimental context can all matter.

The careful conclusion is therefore not that expensive things simply “trick the brain”. Price first shapes expectation; expectation sometimes enters the experience and sometimes stops before it. A blind tasting can temporarily remove the price cue if you want to test your preference, although ordinary enjoyment also includes occasion, story and anticipation. Subjective pleasure can be genuine without proving that a higher price means higher quality.

https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.0706929105
https://doi.org/10.1002/mar.21799