How people identify scents and perceive their pleasantness

In a new JNeurosci paper, Masako Okamoto and colleagues, from the University of Tokyo, explored the brain activity involved in smelling odors. 

The researchers recorded brain activity as study volunteers inhaled a panel of odors. The volunteers also completed questionnaires as well as tests for odor detection, identification, and discrimination. A distinct frequency of brain activity arising soon after odor presentation was linked to detecting odors. Notably, the quality of this activity was associated with the ability to discriminate between odors with high accuracy. Another frequency of activity was linked with scent pleasantness, and this activity didn’t occur until later. Based on questionnaire answers, the fidelity of this activity was associated with a greater awareness of odor pleasantness in daily life. 

Summing up their research, says Okamoto, “In the very early stage after odor onset, the brain primarily encodes objective molecular features of odors to support odor discrimination at the behavioral level, and only later does it begin to represent subjective perceptual attributes, such as pleasantness.” The researchers suggest that the different kinds of brain activity they identified may serve as a way to assess olfactory disorders or inform new strategies for enhancing olfactory function. 

### 

Please contact media@sfn.org for full-text PDF. 

About JNeurosci 

JNeurosci was launched in 1981 as a means to communicate the findings of the highest quality neuroscience research to the growing field. Today, the journal remains committed to publishing cutting-edge neuroscience that will have an immediate and lasting scientific impact, while responding to authors' changing publishing needs, representing breadth of the field and diversity in authorship. 

About The Society for Neuroscience 

The Society for Neuroscience is the world's largest organization of scientists and physicians devoted to understanding the brain and nervous system. The nonprofit organization, founded in 1969, now has nearly 35,000 members in more than 95 countries.