Olfactic communication
Olfactic communication is a channel of nonverbal communication referring to the various ways people and animals communicate and engage in social interaction through their sense of smell. Our human olfactory sense is one of the most phylogenetically primitive and emotionally intimate of the five senses; the sensation of smell is thought to be the most matured and developed human sense.
Human ancestors essentially depended on their sense of smell to alert themselves of danger such as poisonous food and to locate potent mating partners. Using the sense of smell as an instrument paved a way for smell to become a platform of nonverbal communication. Smell also has a significant influence on social interactions. Through their branch of olfaction research, the National Science Foundation recorded that over 70 percent of American adults believe a person's body odor has a significant effect on how interested they will be when conversing with people of a different sex. This process is possible with olfactory bulbs, the part of the brain that discriminates and enhances certain odors. Typically, women will prefer men whose natural odor is similar to their own, while heterosexual men are attracted to females with high estrogen levels and strong menstrual secretions. An entire industry has been developed to provide people with personal smell-masking products, such as perfume, cologne, deodorant, and scented lotions. When a person covers their natural body odor with a pleasant smell, they are communicating their desire to be attractive either emotionally, sexually, or romantically.
History
Olfactics is the most critical sense of human biology for centuries, the first classification system for odors was not developed until the later half of the 1700s by Carolus Linnaeus; today, humans are most dependent on eyesight. Linnaeus' system was composed of seven different categories that various types of smells could be identified with. These categories are champhoraceous musky, floral, pepperminty, ethereal, pungent, and putrid. This classification system has been readvised numerous times and is still being developed to actively interpret human olfactics. Linnaeus' work sparked interest in several colleagues and other scientists, leading to theories of how olfactics are linked to a person's mood and emotional state. This led to the creation of scented room vaporizer in 1851. Eugene Remmel's room perfumer was originally designed to uplift or relax the occupants of the space. However, this invention instead rose to popularity for its simple ability of providing suitable air quality by ventilating small, heavily populated public places. Today, people use scented essential oils in their home or office to create a certain ambience. For example, peppermint is used to uplift dreary attitudes, citrus attracts motivational energy, vanilla is used to promote calmness, and lavender predicts relaxation. Sharing a scent with the entire room spreads a message of what atmosphere the host would like to set and in return, nonverbally communicates the manner in which the guests or visitors should act.In 1916, Hans Henning created a three dimensional smell-prism with six corners. Each corner represented a distinctive smell including flowery or ethereal, putrid, fruity or fragrant, spicy, burned, and resinous. Henning's theory suggested all other smells were a combination of these six and each smell occupied its own location on the prism. This prism led to new developments in understanding olfactics, however not everyone was satisfied with Henning's research. Today, there is still not a universally agreed upon standardized classification system for olfaction. This is primarily due to the drastic differences in how certain smells are perceived by various cultures. Although sufficient research is still being recorded to explain the connection between olfaction and preferences, experts have theorized that certain smells are connected to a person's thinking, creativity, memory, and reaction abilities. This is because when a person is experiencing a negative emotion, their olfaction sense sharpens. This creates a lasting memory, correlating the scent with a certain experience and emotions a person felt. The same patterns can be detected when a person feels joy, sadness, or fear.
Person perception
The attributions we make through the olfactic channel have implications for our moral understandings of ourselves and others, along with the judgments and evaluations we make about identity, social class, status, sex, race, gender and ethnic relationships.How smells impact interactions
Olfactics or smell have incredibly varying interpretations depending on where a person is in the world. In some cultures negative smells can result in positive emotions where in the western world, negative smells are often met with negative emotions. The sense of smell has often been overlooked and understudied and many people often perceive olfactics as a lower importance sense as it pertains to communication. The importance and variation of olfactics can be seen in how different countries use the senses and how different cultures interpret different smells. For example, rot is often a very negative smell and is often met with a tightening reaction in the body including a restricting of the pupils in an attempt for the body to receive a reduced amount of information. However, as the smell may be met with a reaction of disgust in one country, another country may react with happiness as it is a way for some cultures to gauge whether food has finished going through a certain process or not.Olfactics also can impact how someone is received in a social setting in different countries or cultures. In different regions of the world, it is necessary to develop different coding linguistics in order to survive in that area. Smell is one sense that is often poorly coded in human communication in western culture because humans have a hard time identifying smells and communicating them. Researcher Asifa Majid at the University of York argues that there is cross cultural evidence that there are numerous languages that utilize coding olfaction in their language. These languages have encoded smell into their grammar due to their environmental needs. The Umpila are Indigenous people of Australia that have the most codeable olfactory sense in their language.
Due to the impact smell has on the human brain and the reception of different people, it can impact whether or not an individual accepts another individual. Bad smells can drive people away due to the harsh nature of the odors, whereas nice smelling fragrances can communicate positively. During medieval times peasants would often give off horrid odors and the higher noble classes would often look down on them for it, and while the reaction may not be as harsh, the same instances can be seen in today's world. Big corporations can manipulate the olfactic senses in customers or employees by having a nice scent being put out in order to give off feelings of comfort or to promote attitudes of productivity.