Are Those Good Genes I Smell? – Odour Quality Leads to Behavioural Attraction
Jenny Galvao
Peaked by her sniffer?
According to research led by Craig Roberts, University of Liverpool, the “quality” of a person’s body odour predicts the attractiveness of their nonverbal behaviour.
Many factors contribute to overall attractiveness, and it appears that body odour is now one of these factors. Other lesser known attractiveness factors include axillary odour, BMI. and 2D:4D ratio (the ratio between your ring and index finger).
As Roberts says “in humans, attention has focused on potential markers of quality such as facial attractiveness, axillary odour quality, the second-to-fourth digit (2D:4D) ratio and body mass index (BMI). Here we extend this approach to include visually- assessed kinesic cues (nonverbal behaviour linked to movement).”
We know that odour does play a large role in overall attractiveness in terms of our own everyday lives – think about it; if someone has a pleasant smell as opposed to unpleasant, you’re going to be more inclined to approach them.
In this experiment, men were recruited as targets and women as raters. Odour samples were then collected from the men by taping cotton wool under their armpits after they showered with unscented soap and right before they went to sleep. The wool was worn in bed for about 8-10 hours.
Digital coloured photographs of the men were taken from the shoulders up, with a neutral facial expression. Next, they recorded a video edited down from one minute to fifteen seconds – these were all to be shown and rated by women.
After rating the odours, the women rated the photos and videos of the same men for attractiveness on a scale from 1-7. They were then asked how likely they were to pursue a long-term relationship with the men using the same rating scale.
Results showed that there was indeed a strong positive correlation between odour attractiveness and video-rated attractiveness. Interestingly enough, 2D:4D and BMI did not correlate well with the video-rated attractiveness.
Roberts explains that “as predicted if these traits might form part of a common underlying index of genetic quality, we found a strong positive correlation between residualized video-rated attractiveness and body odour attractiveness.”
So, based on the results obtained through this specific experiment, it appears that men who have an attractive odour also have more attractive faces. This is in part explained through the linking of good genes to attractiveness which produces good nonverbals and pleasant body odor.
Genetic quality with respect to body odour does seem to play a role in overall attractiveness of men and the female raters in the study must have subconsciously picked up on this seeing as they gave them higher ratings.
In other words, women have a nose for men with good genes!
There you have it, just one sniff and a woman can “nose-out” her attraction.
While it’s probably near impossible to correct your body odor to signal good genes, certainly pleasant smelling cologne and proper hygiene can go a long way in pleasing the sniffer of Mrs. Right!
About the Author: Jenny Galvao is an undergraduate student at the University of Guelph studying psychology.
Resources
S. Craig Roberts; Alexandra Kralevich; Camille Ferdenzi; Tamsin K. Saxton; Benedict C. Jones; Lisa M. DeBruine; Anthony C. Little and Jan Havlicek. Body Odor Quality Predicts Behavioral Attractiveness in Humans. Arch Sex Behavior. 2019. 40:1111–1117. DOI 10.1007/s10508-011-9803-8.