Once you get used to the smell, the sensor stops detecting it…’smell fatigue’ phenomenon
Entered 2023.09.11 17:20 Views 171 Entered 2023.09.11 17:20 Modified 2023.09.11 17:44 Views 171
It’s not that people can’t smell themselves. You can immediately recognize the smell of sweat or clothes. However, over time, your sense of this specific smell becomes dull. [사진=게티이미지뱅크]You may have been hit by the smell of cigarettes, sweat, or perfume from the person sitting next to you on the subway. The same goes for bad breath while talking to others. However, he is not aware of what kind of smell he is actually emitting.
Everyone has their own specific smell. I just don’t recognize it. It’s easy to understand if you think about people who smoke and don’t know if they smell like cigarettes. How about the experience of spraying perfume a few times in the morning, feeling like the scent wasn’t there, and feeling ‘dull’ a few more times, but then getting on the elevator and seeing people wrinkle their noses? At some point, you get used to the smell of your own room or the smell of your car, and you may not even be able to recognize that smell.
Why can’t we smell our own scent even though we can sniff out other people’s scent like a dog?
After smelling a certain smell, my senses become numb… ‘Smell fatigue’ phenomenon
Of course, this doesn’t mean that people can’t smell themselves. You can immediately recognize the smell of sweat or clothes. However, over time, your sense of this specific smell becomes dull. Our brain works hard to read all the senses around us, but at some point it becomes insensitive to specific smells and becomes ‘odor blind.’ In other words, when a smell becomes too familiar, the brain feels tired and decides to stop detecting the sensor. This is called ‘odor fatigue’.
The reason why you can’t smell your own body smell properly can be explained by the fact that the brain in charge of smell has already become accustomed to it and stops smelling due to the phenomenon of smell fatigue.
Dr. Hiroaki Matsunami, a molecular neurobiologist at Duke University in the U.S., said, “The same phenomenon occurs with all the smells we encounter all the time,” and added, “The cause of smell fatigue has not been fully identified, but it is related to human odor receptors and the brain’s response to odor. “It appears that there has been a change,” he said.
In fact, studies have shown that when people leave air freshener in their rooms, after a few days they are unable to smell the specific smell of the air freshener or even the scent of a summer breeze. “It appears that the sense of smell rarely responds again after smelling something,” said Dr. Pamela Dalton, a psychologist at the Monell Chemical Senses Center in the U.S. “This is because the receptors that normally respond to smells are turned off.” explained.
Dr. Dalton said, “This is a phenomenon that cannot be seen in sight or hearing. Even if the brain’s corresponding receptors adapt to sound or sight, the system generally recovers quickly. However, it takes about 2 to 3 weeks to recover smell sensitivity. “The fact that it got caught is very unique,” he said.
If you can smell your own scent, the people around you smell much stronger!
Humans’ sense of smell is inferior to that of other animals with a developed sense of smell, such as dogs, rats, and pigs. Still, the human nose has approximately 400 different odor receptors and can detect 10 types of odors and more than a trillion different odors.
According to Dr. Rachel Hertz, a neuroscientist at Brown University in the US, the ability to detect one’s own smell is heightened in certain situations. Each person has a unique body odor and can react sensitively to any changes in it. Because we are sensitive to our own body odor, we can sense the smell when there is a slight change. For example, on days when you sweat a lot, your own bad body odor sometimes stings your nose. The interesting thing is that if you suddenly smell your own smell, it is likely that it will be perceived as a much stronger smell to those around you.
There is a way to smell yourself. This means smelling clothes that have fallen off the body, or brushing your hair with clean hands and smelling the tips of your fingers. There are also breath tests, such as the classic hand test (place your hands together next to your face and nose and try to breathe). The easiest thing is to ask close family members or friends.
☞Reference: American science media outlets Livescience and IFLscience
