Adding odor: Less distress and enhanced attention for 6-month-olds

Olfaction scaffolds the developing human from neonate to adolescent and beyond

“…One particularly interesting approach found that children aged 13 years with autistic spectrum disorders (ASD; but not those without) demonstrated enhanced automatic imitation in the presence of their own mother's axillary odour [156,157], indicating that children with ASD have greater attendance to social odours. Finally, through its buffering effects and the provision of an olfactory secure base, maternal odour may be beneficial in reducing fear, optimizing attention and learning, and easing response to novelty (see [158] for similar effects with familiar odorants). More investigation is needed into the emotional balancing and trust-enhancing effects of parent-related odorants, relying on behavioural markers of interpersonal trust and compliance (e.g.…”

Signs, signals, and symbols in olfactics.

“…In Delaunay-El Allam et al' s (2010) study of chamomile, it is likely that the odor was a conditioned stimulus that became associated with feeding, the unconditioned stimulus, and thus is a classical conditioning demonstration. This is less clear in Coffield et al' s (2014) study. Although the scent similar to baby powder may have been associated with caretaking, the evergreen scent would have been far more likely to have been an ambient odor not associated with infant care.…”

“…In children never exposed, the scent had either no or negative effects, compared to a no-odor control. Also noting that familiar scents affect positive mood and behavior, Coffield, Mayhew, Haviland-Jones, and Walker-Andrews (2014) found that exposure to the common odors of rose-scented baby powder or fresh-evergreen cleaner increased infants' attention to a woman' s sad face and reduced the infants' distress facial expression to that face. In this case, the familiar odors helped modulate stress.…”

Smell throughout the life course

“…For instance, breast-feeding human infants were found to discriminate their mother's individual odors (i.e., breast, neck, and axilla) by 3 days postpartum, 49 and maternal smells were shown to have a soothing effect on newborns and children. 85 Other evidence suggests that mothers appeared able to recognize their baby's smell among other infants 86 ; mothers of older children (i.e., 6 years old) were also shown to be able to recognize the smell of T-shirts worn by their offspring. 87 Nevertheless, this pool of studies remains limited, and their results are still often inconsistent, thus hindering our understanding of early-life olfactory communication in our species.…”