Cover Your Nose! You might Get Into A Fight!

by kevin ivan chan

It is quite a known fact that the olfactory system plays a role in human interaction. We most readily interact with a person with a pleasing smell. We feel more attracted to our significant other because of pheromones. And conversely, we really try to avoid peop

le um, frankly, who are lets say "odorly challenged". RIght? NO JUDGMENT please but we do. But aside from this, what else does the olfaction play in social relationships?

The researchers asked this question to what does olfaction play in social interaction. More specifically does it play a part in physical aggression? The aforementioned study seeks to examine t

he potential effects of pleasant scents on one form of social behavior: physical aggression. Their literature suggest that pheromones can exert powerful effects on increasing the attractiveness of both males and females to the opposite sex. Hence it can play an agonistic behavior as well.

The researchers have a very dichotomous hypothesis, they either believe that a) scent exerts its impact promarilty through increments in general arousal, hence the presence of a pleasant aroma might increase aggression in the context of past provocation (pleasant aroma can indeed induce aggression due to provocation) or b) scents exerts its impact mainly through shifts in affect or mood, hence a pleasant scent might induce positive affective states which are incompatible with anger or aggression.

The study employed a 3 x 2 x 2 factorial design based on 3 levels of a pleasant scent, two levels of anger arousal and the sex of the victim. For the pleasant scent variable, one third was subject to a pleasant scent (perfume), one third to a mildly pleasant scent (pine-scented aerosol) and the last third to control condition (no aroma at all). For the anger arousal variable, subjects were first angered or not angered. This was done by having through the following setup. A participant and a confederate were first placed in a room then asked to rate each other based on a series of traits (intelligence, maturity and sincerity). Participants in the nonangry condition, received very much favorable ratings. Whereas participants in the angry group, received highly unfavorable ratings.

After this, both the confederate and participant was brought to another room. THey were told that that part of the study was concerned with the effects on unpleasant stimuli on physiological reactions and in order to study this one ofthe two persons present would serve as a responder and receive a series of electric shocks of varying intensity from the other person while the other person would be the stimulator. Obviously, the confederate would be chosen as the responder. That means, the similar to MIlgram's ever infamous experiment, the participants had to administer a form of shock to the confederate. This is where the scents would come into play. The participants were presented to a pleasant scent, mildly pleasant scent and control condition.

Results showed that indeed, pleasant scent can exert important effects upon human social behavior. Results show that when the victim was male, that is when the confederate was male, aggression was increased by the presence of perfume if subjects were previously angered (with the personality ratings) but reduced by this scent if they have not been angered. In contrast, when the confederate was female (referring to the confederate)aggression was enhanced by the presence of perfume regardless of whether subjects had been previously been angered or not.

FOR ME THIS WAS REALLY SUPRISING! Pleasant scents induce aggression?? WOW!! This is contrary what what we know. Like malls try to have pleasing smells for the totality of the ambiance but this study undermines the effect of pleasing fragrances. Are hotels and restaurants wasting their money on pleasant fragrances?

The billion dollar industry on fragrances are now in trouble. To quote the researcher, "unquestioning faith in the benefits of perfume, cologne, and similar products does not seem justified." Well these are the questions which I really hoped that the researcher answered. If I wou

ld contact the researcher i would really ask him these questions! I mean his study is straight forward and saying the adverse of the pleasing scent they used.

Maybe the type of scent they used was not preferred by the 45 people who participated in the study. The perfumed that they used was "Jungle Gardenia" which was rated by a panel of 5 undergraduate judges. Maybe 5 participants were not enough to suffice say that Jungle gardenia is a pleasant smell.

Personally, maybe aggression only increases (as brought about by pleasant fragrances) for strangers, as what happened n the study. I doubt that this study will hold through for people who are really acquainted or who are close.

But we have to take the study into context, so many other variables could come into play. I recall my 115 professor, Ma'am Lagdameo, who said that variables NEVER exist in isolation so it is sometimes hard to externally valiant things we learn in the lab. Even the researchers acknowledge that additional research is needed to identify mediating variables and establish their specific effects.

Sources:

Baron, R. (1980). Olfaction And Human Social Behavior: Effects Of Pleasant Scents on Physical Aggression. Basic And Applied Social Psychology. 1 (20): 163- 172