Perception of everyday odors--correlation between intensity, familiarity and strength of hedonic judgement.

In this study, 40 Japanese, 44 German and 39 Mexican women were presented with 18 everyday odorants. They were asked to rate them for intensity on a six-point scale from not detectable to very strong, for pleasantness on an 11-point scale from -5, to neutral at 0, to +5, and for familiarity on a six-point scale from completely unknown to extremely familiar. Consistent positive correlations were found between paired rating scores for the three measures, and although they were not particularly strong (r(s) range, 0.19-0.60), for most odorants all three correlations were significant. Similar results were obtained whether the data were analyzed on an individual or a national basis. Most notable were the consistent positive correlations between perceived intensity and ratings of familiarity and hedonic strength. It is suggested that the perceived intensity of the odorants depended not only on stimulus concentration but probably also on experience-dependent factors.

[1]  Loredana Hvastja,et al.  Odour Memory and Odour Hedonics in Children , 1989, Perception.

[2]  K. E. Henion,et al.  Odor pleasantness and intensity: a single dimension? , 1971, Journal of experimental psychology.

[3]  R. Doty,et al.  Sex differences in odor identification ability: A cross-cultural analysis , 1985, Neuropsychologia.

[4]  C. Wysocki,et al.  Ability to perceive androstenone can be acquired by ostensibly anosmic people. , 1989, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[5]  M. Laska,et al.  A comparison of the detection thresholds of odour mixtures and their components , 1991 .

[6]  Richard L. Doty,et al.  An examination of relationships between the pleasantness, intensity, and concentration of 10 odorous stimuli , 1975 .

[7]  Nicolette J. van der Klaauw,et al.  The Contribution of Chemosensory Factors to Individual Differences in Reported Food Preferences , 1994, Appetite.

[8]  William S. Cain,et al.  Odor intensity: Differences in the exponent of the psychophysical function , 1969 .

[9]  C. Wysocki,et al.  Induction of olfactory receptor sensitivity in mice. , 1993, Science.

[10]  H. Distel,et al.  Induced Peripheral Sensitivity in the Developing Vertebrate Olfactory System , 1998, Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences.

[11]  W. Cain,et al.  Determinants of measured olfactory sensitivity , 1986, Perception & psychophysics.

[12]  M. Carrasco,et al.  Olfactory perception and olfactory imagery: a multidimensional analysis. , 1993, Journal of experimental psychology. Human perception and performance.

[13]  H. Moskowitz.  Chapter 4 – Intensity and Hedonic Functions for Chemosensory Stimuli , 1977 .

[14]  Paul Laffort,et al.  SELECTED AND STANDARDIZED VALUES OF SUPRATHRESHOLD ODOR INTENSITIES FOR 110 SUBSTANCES , 1975 .

[15]  Birgitta Berglund,et al.  Individual psychophysical functions for 28 odorants , 1971 .

[16]  S. Schiffman.  Physicochemical correlates of olfactory quality. , 1974, Science.

[17]  B. Schaal.  Olfaction in infants and children: developmental and functional perspectives , 1988 .

[18]  Charles J. Wysocki,et al.  The influence of cognitive bias on the perceived odor, irritation and health symptoms from chemical exposure , 1997, International archives of occupational and environmental health.

[19]  E. P. Koster,et al.  Perceived fragrance complexity and its relationship to familiarity and pleasantness II , 1979 .

[20]  R. Doty,et al.  Development of the university of pennsylvania smell identification test: A standardized microencapsulated test of olfactory function , 1984, Physiology & Behavior.

[21]  W S Cain,et al.  Odor recognition: familiarity, identifiability, and encoding consistency. , 1984, Journal of experimental psychology. Learning, memory, and cognition.

[22]  D. Lancet,et al.  Concentration-dependent changes of perceived odor quality , 1988 .

[23]  E. Koss,et al.  Perfumery: The Psychology and Biology of Fragrance , 1991 .

[24]  Robert G. Mair,et al.  Chapter 5 – Influence of Internal Factors on the Perceived Intensity and Pleasantness of Gustatory and Olfactory Stimuli , 1977 .

[25]  T. Engen.  THE POTENTIAL USEFULNESS OF SENSATIONS OF ODOR AND TASTE IN KEEPING CHILDREN AWAY FROM HARMFUL SUBSTANCES * , 1974, Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences.

[26]  P. Rozin.  The Selection of Foods by Rats, Humans, and Other Animals , 1976 .

[27]  B. Berglund,et al.  Multidimensional analysis of twenty-one odors. , 1973, Scandinavian journal of psychology.

[28]  The acquisition of odour hedonics , 1988 .

[29]  W. Cain.  Odor identification by males and females: Predictions vs performance. , 1982 .

[30]  R. Harper,et al.  Odour description and odour classification: A multidisciplinary examination, , 1968 .

[31]  Masaaki Yoshida,et al.  STUDIES OF PSYCHOMETRIC CLASSIFICATION OF ODORS (5) , 1964 .

[32]  John E. Amoore,et al.  Olfactory Genetics and Anosmia , 1971 .

[33]  R. Doty,et al.  Tests of human olfactory function: Principal components analysis suggests that most measure a common source of variance , 1994, Perception & psychophysics.

[34]  Howard R. Moskowitz,et al.  Odor intensity and pleasantness of butanol , 1974 .

[35]  H. T. Lawless.  Odour description and odour classification revisited , 1988 .

[36]  Howard R. Moskowitz,et al.  Odor intensity and pleasantness for a diverse set of odorants , 1976 .

[37]  T Kobayakawa,et al.  Differences in perception of everyday odors: a Japanese-German cross-cultural study. , 1998, Chemical senses.

[38]  W. Moody,et al.  Evidence for a peripheral olfactory memory in imprinted salmon. , 1994, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[39]  P. Dalton,et al.  Odor perception and beliefs about risk. , 1996, Chemical senses.