Carbonated drinks are the most popular sugar-contained beverages which might be one of the causes of
excessive sugar consumption in Thai children. Stepwise sugar reduction technique, in which the sugar concentration
no greater than a person’s difference threshold is gradually reduced, is among one of the strategies used to assist
people to reduce their sugar consumption. The objective of the present study was to determine the sweet difference
threshold of a carbonated test drink in 8-year-old children. Paired-comparisons, forced-choice tests and survival
analysis were used in determining the sweet difference threshold of 64 school children. Demographic data, sweet
snack and beverage consumption were collected by a questionnaire. The results showed that the overall sweet
difference threshold was 15 %. No significant difference in sweet difference threshold was found between gender,
areas of school (municipal vs non-municipal), parents’ education, family income, frequency of sweet snack and
beverage consumption, frequency of strawberry-flavored-carbonated-drink consumption and frequency of adding
sugar in their food. The threshold was greater than that obtained from a non-carbonated drink reported previously,
indicating the possible effect of carbonation on sweet perception. The threshold value could be used to set the
percentage sugar reduction steps in the stepwise sugar reduction program.