Odor and affect: Individual differences in the impact of odor on liking for places, things and people

This paper provides evidence of substantial individual differences in the a ffective importance of odors, and offers initial validation for an eight-it em scale of the impact of odor (AlO) on liking for people, places, foods an d cosmetic/health products. In study 1, 116 American college students and 3 36 Flemish Belgian college students completed the AlO along with other meas ures of reactions to odors and to commercial products designed to mask body odors. There were substantial individual differences in AlO scores, but me ans were similar for males and females, and for US and Belgian respondents. Higher AlO scores were associated with more odor-mediated memory, more att ention to odors and more liking or disliking for odors as a function of the ir association with liked and disliked persons. AlO scores were not related to preference for toiletries with artificial scents, to use of products to mask natural body odors, or to disgust sensitivity. In study 2, AlO scores were strongly related to a measure of evaluative conditioning (a form of P avlovian associative learning) in the laboratory, using liked and disliked odors as unconditioned stimuli and pictures of faces as conditioned stimuli .