Little is known about how liking for different foods develops from birth to adulthood. Although there are both cultural and sensory aspects to the development of food preferences, the focus of this study is on the sensory aspects of food preference development, in particular, preferences for meat. Two main aims are addressed : 1/. To develop a robust methodology that can be used to determine pre-literate and recently literate children's liking for different foods and the determinants of that liking. 2/. To investigate the effects of early experience with foods on later food preferences.Several tests were conducted and results noted. Overall the results of this thesis show that it is possible to gather reliable hedonic data from young, even pre-school children, and that it is possible that very early feeding experience has some influence on adults' food preferences. / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)