Cargando…

The role of fragrance and self-esteem in perception of body odors and impressions of others

Human sweat odor serves as social communication signal for a person’s traits and emotional states. This study explored whether body odors can also communicate information about one’s self-esteem, and the role of applied fragrance in this relationship. Female participants were asked to rate self-este...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Croijmans, Ilja, Beetsma, Daniel, Aarts, Henk, Gortemaker, Ilse, Smeets, Monique
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8592444/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34780484
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0258773
_version_ 1784599457523826688
author Croijmans, Ilja
Beetsma, Daniel
Aarts, Henk
Gortemaker, Ilse
Smeets, Monique
author_facet Croijmans, Ilja
Beetsma, Daniel
Aarts, Henk
Gortemaker, Ilse
Smeets, Monique
author_sort Croijmans, Ilja
collection PubMed
description Human sweat odor serves as social communication signal for a person’s traits and emotional states. This study explored whether body odors can also communicate information about one’s self-esteem, and the role of applied fragrance in this relationship. Female participants were asked to rate self-esteem and attractiveness of different male contestants of a dating show, while being exposed to male participant’s body odors differing in self-esteem. High self-esteem sweat was rated more pleasant and less intense than low self-esteem sweat. However, there was no difference in perceived self-esteem and attractiveness of male contestants in videos, hence explicit differences in body odor did not transfer to judgments of related person characteristics. When the body odor was fragranced using a fragranced body spray, male contestants were rated as having higher self-esteem and being more attractive. The finding that body odors from male participants differing in self-esteem are rated differently and can be discriminated suggests self-esteem has distinct perceivable olfactory features, but the remaining findings imply that only fragrance affect the psychological impression someone makes. These findings are discussed in the context of the role of body odor and fragrance in human perception and social communication.
format Online
Article
Text
id pubmed-8592444
institution National Center for Biotechnology Information
language English
publishDate 2021
publisher Public Library of Science
record_format MEDLINE/PubMed
spelling pubmed-85924442021-11-16 The role of fragrance and self-esteem in perception of body odors and impressions of others Croijmans, Ilja Beetsma, Daniel Aarts, Henk Gortemaker, Ilse Smeets, Monique PLoS One Research Article Human sweat odor serves as social communication signal for a person’s traits and emotional states. This study explored whether body odors can also communicate information about one’s self-esteem, and the role of applied fragrance in this relationship. Female participants were asked to rate self-esteem and attractiveness of different male contestants of a dating show, while being exposed to male participant’s body odors differing in self-esteem. High self-esteem sweat was rated more pleasant and less intense than low self-esteem sweat. However, there was no difference in perceived self-esteem and attractiveness of male contestants in videos, hence explicit differences in body odor did not transfer to judgments of related person characteristics. When the body odor was fragranced using a fragranced body spray, male contestants were rated as having higher self-esteem and being more attractive. The finding that body odors from male participants differing in self-esteem are rated differently and can be discriminated suggests self-esteem has distinct perceivable olfactory features, but the remaining findings imply that only fragrance affect the psychological impression someone makes. These findings are discussed in the context of the role of body odor and fragrance in human perception and social communication. Public Library of Science 2021-11-15 /pmc/articles/PMC8592444/ /pubmed/34780484 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0258773 Text en © 2021 Croijmans et al https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Croijmans, Ilja
Beetsma, Daniel
Aarts, Henk
Gortemaker, Ilse
Smeets, Monique
The role of fragrance and self-esteem in perception of body odors and impressions of others
title The role of fragrance and self-esteem in perception of body odors and impressions of others
title_full The role of fragrance and self-esteem in perception of body odors and impressions of others
title_fullStr The role of fragrance and self-esteem in perception of body odors and impressions of others
title_full_unstemmed The role of fragrance and self-esteem in perception of body odors and impressions of others
title_short The role of fragrance and self-esteem in perception of body odors and impressions of others
title_sort role of fragrance and self-esteem in perception of body odors and impressions of others
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8592444/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34780484
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0258773
work_keys_str_mv AT croijmansilja theroleoffragranceandselfesteeminperceptionofbodyodorsandimpressionsofothers
AT beetsmadaniel theroleoffragranceandselfesteeminperceptionofbodyodorsandimpressionsofothers
AT aartshenk theroleoffragranceandselfesteeminperceptionofbodyodorsandimpressionsofothers
AT gortemakerilse theroleoffragranceandselfesteeminperceptionofbodyodorsandimpressionsofothers
AT smeetsmonique theroleoffragranceandselfesteeminperceptionofbodyodorsandimpressionsofothers
AT croijmansilja roleoffragranceandselfesteeminperceptionofbodyodorsandimpressionsofothers
AT beetsmadaniel roleoffragranceandselfesteeminperceptionofbodyodorsandimpressionsofothers
AT aartshenk roleoffragranceandselfesteeminperceptionofbodyodorsandimpressionsofothers
AT gortemakerilse roleoffragranceandselfesteeminperceptionofbodyodorsandimpressionsofothers
AT smeetsmonique roleoffragranceandselfesteeminperceptionofbodyodorsandimpressionsofothers