People love coffee, beer and sugary drinks for the hit not the taste, and it’s genetic, study finds

Researchers seeking the taste genes responsible for what we drink found our preferences were instead linked to the effects of alcohol, coffee and sugary drinks

The findings could help in the search for ways to intervene when consumption patterns become unhealthy

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Our preferences for alcoholic drinks and coffee are genetically linked to their psychostimulant effects. Photo: Alamy

Published: 4:30pm, 4 May 2019Updated: 4:30pm, 4 May 2019

Fancy yourself a coffee connoisseur with a love for dark roasts? Or maybe hoppy pale ales are more your thing.

The truth may be that our preferences for caffeine, alcoholic drinks – or sugary ones – derive not so much from the way they taste but how they make us feel, according to a new study by genetic scientists at Northwestern University in the United States published in Human Molecular Genetics on Thursday.

Researcher Marilyn Cornelis, who has published previously on the genetics of coffee consumption, set out to determine which taste genes are responsible for what we drink.

To her and the team’s surprise, people’s preferences weren’t based on variations in taste genes but rather the genes that are related to the drinks’ mind-altering effects.

Marilyn Cornelis led a study into how genetics affect our preferences for drinks.

“The genetics underlying our preferences are related to the psychoactive components of these drinks,” says Cornelis.