Appeal No. 2001-1390
Application No. 08/922,599
preference from hedonic data. However, contrary to appellants'
point of view, claim 1 does not address a "calculating" step.
Giving claim 1 its broadest reasonable interpretation, it appears
to us that those having ordinary skill in the art would
comprehend the claimed "processing" of hedonic test data to
determine at least one predicted forced choice result to broadly
denote a mental assessment or review of hedonic test data to
determine at least one predicted forced choice result. For
example, if two consumers, in hedonic testing, tested only
competing food products A and B, on the basis of taste and
appearance categories, and each gave the highest rating in both
categories to product A, it is quite apparent to us that one
having ordinary skill in the art would have been able to process
(mentally assess or consider) this hedonic test data and predict
a forced choice preference result (product A). The latter view
is clearly supported by the Peryam disclosure. Declarant points
out (paragraph 9) that the Peryam reference ("Hedonic Scale
Method of Measuring Food Preferences") has been reviewed but that
the examiner is incorrect in asserting that it would have been
obvious from this reference "to process the hedonic scale data to
obtain forced choice comparison information," since there is no
suggestion in the reference to do so. It appears to us that
7
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007