Dr Michelle Dickinson: Is scent preference universal or cultural?

So, what do you think humans' favourite is? Coffee? Freshly baked bread? The smell of rain after a long dry period? Petrol? Frangipani? Moss?  Scientists wanted to know whether scent preference was universal amongst humans or if there were cultural factors involved – their results are published this week in the journal Current Biology https://www.cell.com/current-biology/fulltext/S0960-9822(22)00332-3They asked 225 individuals from ten distinct cultural groups, including city dwellers, indigenous hunter-gatherers, and people from traditional rural farming and fishing communities across countries including the United States, Mexico and Thailand to smell 10 very different scents and rank them from most to least favourite.  The study was careful to select some isolated individuals that had little or no prior exposure to Western odours to take part. The scents included chemicals that smelled like sweaty feet, decaying fish, mushrooms, lavender and vanilla. They discovered that cultural affiliations, where in the world they lived, what language they spoke and what they ate had no impact on how much someone liked a smell. Instead, it seems that humans – wherever they live and whatever their cultural experience – all seem to prefer the same scent.  In this case, it was vanilla. The researchers speculate that scent preference is universal and independent of geography or lifestyle, because certain odours may be historically linked to an increased chance of survival. We may historically have learned that a certain smell was associated with a toxic plant by our ancient ancestors and passed this on through the generations. The opposite could also be true in that a smell because they were produced by other plants which were safe to eat. So, there you go, the next time you dig into your vanilla ice cream or smell your vanilla-scented candle you can be reassured that it would be appreciated by anyone in the world. Also, in case you were wondering, universally, the least favourite smell was that of smelly feet. Dr Michelle Dickinson joined Francesca Rudkin. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.