I have friends, a married couple, who for years have stubbornly argued over the question of whether different shapes of pasta actually taste different.

She, the more sensory-driven and less logical personality, is adamant that this is the case and that every type of pasta triggers a subtle flavour difference, its own unique taste signature. He, an avowed atheist and arch-sceptic of anything that remotely smacks of magical thinking, denies that such a thing is even possible.

Being a pasta fanatic and having tried nearly every nomenclature of noodle, I see the validity of the question as well as both sides of the debate. And much to their chagrin, I have never taken sides because they are both, in their own way, correct—as I’ll now explain. Yet the perspective of the Mrs carries more weight because there is something at play between a pasta’s shape and what we refer to as “taste.”

Here’s an explanation, after which I’ll get into why this interests me at all:

Different pastas made with the same ingredients, strictly speaking, will taste the same. Taste refers to the five categories of: sweet, sour, salty, bitter, and umami. However, a pasta’s shape—whether rigatoni, angel hair, or elbow macaroni—will create a slightly different eating experience. And that, in turn, will affect the way we perceive the flavour, because more than taste alone is involved in how we experience flavour. Texture, shape and consistency, we are told, affect how flavour is experienced.

Rigatoni’s ridges, thickness and tubular shape, and the way it holds the sauce, will register in the brain differently as we eat, then say, angel hair, which will have a completely different sensory impact. Even the way those pastas look on the plate and how you attack and chew them will also change the overall eating experience from one to another.

The result of these differing factors seem to be that our perception of flavour—not taste—is transformed ever so subtly from one to the next. This may be splitting hairs to some. More people than just my friend’s wife have remarked on this phenomenon, which does on the surface seem to defy logic—and require clarification.

Why does this absurdly narrow and seemingly insignificant question matter enough to warrant mention at all? Because it illustrates, albeit on a smaller scale, the importance of context. When one factor in a set of factors changes, even the tiniest one, the whole is transformed as a result.

Returning to the example of Italian food again: the same pasta dish, say, a seafood linguini, made in the same way and in the same kitchen, might still “taste” (ie – present flavourfully) as  different depending on whether its eaten al fresco at a table metres from the sea, or inside of a dark old rustic home on a hilltop 5 km inland with no view of the coast. Eating that dish with its shrimp, clams and mussels, outdoors as you inhale the sea breeze and watch and hear the waves lapping the shore might make your meal taste more ‘fishy’ and fresh.

I remember long ago when I used to shop for new music CDs at the HMV store, you could ask to sample the album at a listening station with headphones. I often found that new music which I sampled in-store, which I liked and then purchased, sounded very different when I later played it at home. Because of that I tended to return most new CDs I chose that way because it turned out that I didn’t really enjoy the music after all.

The same thing happens today when I hear a new song I like blaring at a bar or restaurant and then use the ‘Shazam’ app on my smartphone to identify and download it later at home: the song afterwards usually sounds unrecognizable and feels like a bit of a dud.

It may be the same song playing at both locations, but the context—where you are, who you’re with, your mood and state of mind, the sound system, and the room’s acoustics—might differ enough to change the overall experience of it.

So, what’s the takeaway?

Context is everything. Circumstances alter cases. Too often we equate one thing (or situation) with another without considering the slight, unobtrusive differences that might make them sufficiently different.