The predominant theory of mesolimbic dopamine function in recent years has been the incentive salience hypothesis, which describes the role of midbrain dopaminergic circuits as encoding 'wanting', but not 'liking' of rewards, resulting in a dissociation of the two functions. However, until now, this dissociation was only established in separate behavioural assays. Here, we propose that the Sucrose Preference Test (SPT), which has previously been used to measure 'liking', can actually be interpreted in terms of both 'wanting' and 'liking': while relative preference is a proxy for 'liking', we argue that absolute consumption of sucrose is indicative of 'wanting'. To test this supposition, we conducted the SPT in hypodopaminergic DAT-tg rats. While DAT-tg rats exhibited reduced absolute consumption of sucrose, their relative preference for sucrose was unimpaired compared to wildtype rats. When interpreted in terms of the incentive salience hypothesis of DA function, these results indicate that absolute consumption in the SPT depends on 'wanting' and that the SPT is a valuable instrument for dissociating 'wanting' and 'liking' within the same behavioural paradigm.