The results were published on Wednesday by the Journal of Wine Economics and reported by LA Times. The study was conducted by a retired oceanography Professor Robert Hodgson who also taught statistics at the university and now owns a small winery. Apparently he designed the study because he couldn't understand why some of his wines would win gold medals in some competitions while nothing at all in others, making him wonder if getting medals was just a matter of luck.
Hodgson claims that the judging business is characterized by inconsistent decision-making by judges and wide variability among competitions. "Consumers should have a healthy skepticism about the medals awarded to wines from the various competitions," he said.
Hodgson's findings have prompted state fair officials to consider making changes in the way they operate future wine competitions. "We want to do whatever we can to smell and taste wines to get the best results," said G.M. Pucilowski, a professional wine educator and chief judge for the state fair.
State fair officials, who cooperated with the study, said Hodgson's findings provided valuable information that could be used to improve wine competitions. The competition plans to reduce the number of wines sampled per day from the current 150 or more to as few as 75 to help judges avoid the sensory fatigue that can cloud their ratings.
Hodgson says he doesn't put any more trust in the 100-point-scale ratings of wines from magazines and newsletters than he does in medal winners. "Consumers need to gain more self-confidence in their own opinions and tastes rather than listen to what other people think wine should be like," Hodgson said.
Last year, 649 wineries entered 2,917 California wines into the annual state fair contest, the oldest wine competition in the US. Out of 2,917 wines entered 1,587 wines or about 55% won awards. This is perhaps the highest proportion amongst competitions around the world, where 30-35% is the norm.
"Wine judges in the setting of a competition must make about a hundred decisions a day. It is in this environment where I think their ability is taxed beyond a reasonable level," Hodgson said.
He also reportedly discovered that a "super judge" who is consistent in his or her ratings one year does not maintain that superiority the next year. |