Subliminal Smells Can Guide Social Preferences

• Published in: Psychological science Vol. 18; no. 12; pp. 1044 - 1049
• Main Authors: Li, Wen, Moallem, Isabel, Paller, Ken A., Gottfried, Jay A.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Los Angeles, CA Blackwell Publishing 01.12.2007; SAGE Publications; SAGE PUBLICATIONS, INC
• Subjects: Adolescent; Adult; Awareness; Bottles; Choice Behavior; Circuits; Emotional expression; Emotions; Escape; Face; Facial Expression; Female; Heart rate; Humans; Likeability; Male; Memory; Neurology; Odorants; Odors; Olfactory perception; Preferences; Priming; Psychology; Research Reports; Senses; Signal Detection, Psychological; Smell; Social Perception; Social psychology; Sublimation, Psychological; Subliminal perception; Sympathy; Thresholds; Unconscious mind; Unconsciousness; Unpleasant; Visual Perception

It is widely accepted that unconscious processes can modulate judgments and behavior, but do such influences affect one's daily interactions with other people? Given that olfactory information has relatively direct access to cortical and subcortical emotional circuits, we tested whether the aff...