Sense of smell gets bored quickly and easily

Have you ever entered a bakery or a florist and gotten overwhelmed with the intriguing aromas, only to not smell anything by the time you’re checking out?

“After two breaths, the receptors in your nose sort of switch off,” says Pamela Dalton, a psychologist at Monell Chemical Senses Centre who has been studying the phenomenon of nose-blindness for more than 20 years. “The intensity of the smell fades because your brain has perceived the scent as nonthreatening, which means it has no need to pay attention to it.”

Fragrance

Did you know that you actually smell with your brain, not your nose? Sure, your nose detects scent molecules, but it’s your brain that actually identifies them.

Where did the word perfume come from?

The word perfume comes from the Latin words ‘per fume’ which means ‘through smoke’, probably because the earliest ones were incense-based, and were primarily crafted from spices and herbs, such as coriander and frankincense.

Scent evokes memories

However, unlike memories created by your other senses, a study conducted by New York Academy of Sciences discovered that all your scent memories are formed within the first ten years of your life.

Perfumers have to identify at least 250 scents for their first test. Known as ‘Noses’, these people have the most coveted job of designing scents. Of course, they have to be really skilled to differentiate between upwards of 250 scents before they qualify, which explains why there are only 50 of them in the world.

Published in Dawn, Young World, May 6th, 2017