Differential Age and Sex Effects in Semantic Recognition of Odors and Words

Larsson, Maria; Hedner, Margareta; Olofsson, Jonas

doi:10.3724/sp.j.1041.2009.01049

Cited by 8 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 24 publications

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“…According to Mackay-Sim et al (2006), "significantly reduced sensory sensitivity, even ability, is considered by many to be a normal consequence of aging." This idea has indeed been supported by findings from numerous studies (Hedner et al, 2010;Lehrner, 1999), and the pivotal age after which olfactory performance decreases the most seems to be somewhere between 55 (Doty and Kamath, 2014) and 65 years old (Larsson et al 2009). However, the nature of this impairment was addressed by Mackay-Sim et al (2006), who suggested that the decrease in olfactory performance in aging populations may be explained by the onset of pathologies, rather than age-related decline itself.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 81%

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Effects of Gender and Age on Self-reported Odor Imagery Ability

et al. 2022

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Introduction Odor imagery is known to be more difficult than any other modality of sensory imagery. Consequently, wide between-individuals variability can be found in odor imagery ability. Several studies have shown a positive relationship between olfactory performance and odor imagery ability. In the light of factors known to influence smelling ability, this study therefore investigated the effects of two factors -gender and age -known to influence smelling ability, on self-declared odor imagery ability in normosmic individuals. Methods Seven hundred and nine French participants were asked to complete the web version of the French Vividness of Olfactory Imagery Questionnaire (fVOIQ). General linear models were used to determine the contributions of gender and age to odor imagery vividness scores. Moreover, scores were compared between age intervals ranging from 18-30 years old to 60 + years old. Results Our findings reveal that at any age, men and women have the same odor imagery ability. Odor imagery ability in self-declared normosmic individuals improves with age until 50-60 years old, and beyond this point the often-reported agerelated olfactory decay does not alter it. Conclusions These findings suggest a high contribution of daily olfactory experience to the development of this cognitive function, and a relationship with olfactory performance that appears less linear than hypothesized. Implications This study provides food for thought in the field of olfaction: it suggests that distinct mechanisms may underlie two cognitive processes, perception and sensory imagery.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 81%

“…Regarding gender, many studies have shown the superiority of women in tasks measuring olfactory performance, whether it be in odor identification (Larsson et al 2009), detection (Hedner et al, 2010) or discrimination (Hummel et al 2007). Brand and Millot (2001) have suggested two reasons for this effect of gender.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effects of Gender and Age on Self-reported Odor Imagery Ability

et al. 2022

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The influence of ambient aroma on middle school students' academic emotions

2022

Int J Psychol

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This study investigated the influence of ambient aroma on the academic emotions experienced by middle school students in a practical educational environment. The study was conducted with pre‐ and post‐test experimental design upon subjects in three parallel classes (n = 109) in grade two of a junior school in China. These classes were randomly assigned to one of three experimental conditions (no aroma, daily aroma or aroma every other day). The academic emotions of the students were measured twice using the Adolescent Academic Emotion Questionnaire, once before and once 8 weeks after the use of aromatherapy. Comparison of the change in ratings from baseline to post‐test showed that compared to the control class; joy, hope, positive high‐arousal academic emotion and relaxation were significantly higher in ambient aroma conditions, and anger and negative high‐arousal academic emotion in these conditions were significantly lower. The results suggest that the ambient aroma of sweet orange essential oil can mitigate the reduction in positive academic emotion and improve negative academic emotion in school students over time.

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Odor-Evoked Autobiographical Memories: Age and Gender Differences Along the Life Span

Zucco¹,

Aiello²,

Turuani³

et al. 2011

Chemical Senses

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Odors are powerful in bringing back old and vivid memories bearing emotional content. This inherent hedonic property of olfactory stimuli makes this sensory modality particularly suitable for studying autobiographical memory. In the present work, adolescents (first experiment), young adults (second experiment), and elderly (third experiment) of both sexes were asked to smell 10 familiar odorants and to report if these odorants evoked personal autobiographical memories or referential memories (i.e., names and objects). The participants were then required to link these memories to triplets of words using the progressive elaboration method of the Loci mnemonic. The aim of the study was to investigate whether 1) odorants evoking autobiographical memories led to faster reaction times (RTs) and to a greater number of correct responses in the recall of the items associated to such memories than do odorants evoking referential memories, 2) females differed from males on the above tasks along with the life span, and 3) the preferential codes (i.e., autobiographical or referential) attributed to the odorants vary according to gender and age. In general, it was observed that the way in which the odorants were encoded affected the subsequent retrieval. Indeed, data analyses have shown that odorants evoking autobiographical memories lead to faster RTs (experiments 2 and 3) and that females outperform males (experiments 1 and 2). However, these effects are greatly age and gender dependent. Furthermore, females are more prone than males to code the odorants autobiographically (as shown by the higher amount of autobiographical experiences that they have provided at all ages relative to males). Results are discussed in terms of developmental differences and odor-emotion links and the possible role of odors and autobiographical memory in learning and retrieval of other items.

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Differential Age and Sex Effects in Semantic Recognition of Odors and Words

Cited by 8 publications

References 24 publications

Effects of Gender and Age on Self-reported Odor Imagery Ability

Effects of Gender and Age on Self-reported Odor Imagery Ability

The influence of ambient aroma on middle school students' academic emotions

Odor-Evoked Autobiographical Memories: Age and Gender Differences Along the Life Span

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