The Relationship Between Olfactory Function and Emotional Contagion

The relationship between social odour awareness and emotional contagion susceptibility in females

Previous research has shown a strong link between our sense of smell and emotion. More recently, the importance we attach to olfaction has been found to relate to our susceptibility to 'catch' the emotions of others. We explore this further by examining the relation between a newly developed measure of olfaction (social odour scale, SOS), which measures awareness of social odours, and emotional contagion susceptibility in female participants. The study therefore aimed to test the strength of this relationship and also help validate the English language version of the SOS. Female (n = 148) participants completed an online study that measured odour awareness [SOS; important of odour questionnaire, IOQ] and emotional contagion (EC). We found that the English version of the SOS yielded high reliability and supported the previous factor structure of the scale; additionally, we demonstrated a strong association between the SOS and IOQ which provides criterion validity for its usage. The study also revealed that whilst both the SOS and IOQ were positively associated with EC, the SOS was the more accurate predictor. These findings provide further validation for the use of the SOS and suggest that our subjective awareness of olfaction, especially concerning 'social odours' is an accurate predictor of emotional contagion.

Olfactory metacognition and memory in individuals with different subjective odor imagery abilities

Imagery vividness is one of the key indicators to evaluate the ability to generate mental images. There is large inter-individual variability in olfactory imagery (OI) abilities, however, little is known about the underlying factors for individual OI abilities. Using a word cueing imagery paradigm and the trial-by-trial imagery vividness rating method, participants with high or low OI abilities (differentiated by the Vividness of Olfactory Imagery Questionnaire) completed two OI tasks with either shorter (2 s) or longer (8 s) image generation time. Participants' olfactory function, olfactory-related working memory and episodic recognition memory were measured using validated methods. Moreover, olfactory metacognition was assessed using the Odor Awareness Scale (OAS) and the Importance of Olfaction Questionnaire (IOQ). Compared to participants with high OI abilities, those with low OI abilities reported less vivid odor images during OI tasks. For participants with low OI abilities, the imagery vividness significantly improved as the image generation time increased. There was no difference regarding olfactory perception or olfactory-related memory performances between the high and the low OI ability groups. However, participants with higher OI abilities had significant higher scores on the OAS and the IOQ, indicating a superior olfactory-related metacognition. These results provide evidences supporting the underlying factors that related to variances of subjective ability of generating vivid odor mental images.

Recent Progress in Electronic Noses for Fermented Foods and Beverages Applications

Fermented foods and beverages have become a part of daily diets in several societies around the world. Emitted volatile organic compounds play an important role in the determination of the chemical composition and other information of fermented foods and beverages. Electronic nose (E-nose) technologies enable non-destructive measurement and fast analysis, have low operating costs and simplicity, and have been employed for this purpose over the past decades. In this work, a comprehensive review of the recent progress in E-noses is presented according to the end products of the main fermentation types, including alcohol fermentation, lactic acid fermentation, acetic acid fermentation and alkaline fermentation. The benefits, research directions, limitations and challenges of current E-nose systems are investigated and highlighted for fermented foods and beverage applications.