Script defined "types" to speed up searching...

I'm working on some ai code and find myself doing a good deal of scanning through objects like so:

%interestMask = $TypeMasks::ItemObjectType | $TypeMasks::PlayerObjectType;

    initContainerRadiusSearch( %obj.position, %obj.ai_seeRange, %interestMask);

    while( (%possibleInterest=containerSearchNext()) != 0)
    {
		if(isAwareOfObject(%obj, %possibleInterest, %obj.ai_seeFOVcos, %obj.ai_seeRange, %obj.ai_hearRange))
		{
			switch$( %possibleInterest.getclassname() )
			{
				case "AIPlayer":
				    //echo("saw an AIPlayer");
				    switch$(%possibleInterest.getDataBlock().getname() )
				    {
						case "SheepBody":
							//echo("saw another sheep");
													case "ShadowBody":
						    //echo("saw a monster!");
					}

blah blah blah etc etc so on and so forth..

this works fine, but I feel like it must be scanning too many objects.
is there some better way to do this?

one thing I was thinking would be if script allowed you to set a dynamic script defined type for some objects

then I could define in script a $TypeMask::FoodType, and set that flag on anything that might be food.

then the engine could check agains that when deciding if the item is a candidate in the search.

seems like it would speed things up.

I realize that I can do this in code, add a new type do a rebuild etc....not hard, but if it could be done in script it would be a quicker turn around while coding.

thanks for any pointers.