Irritancy Expectancy Alters Odor Perception: Evidence From Olfactory Event-Related Potential Research

Bulsing, Patricia J.; Smeets, Monique A. M.; Gemeinhardt, Christian; Laverman, Martin; Schuster, Benno; Hout, Marcel A. van den; Hummel, Thomas

doi:10.1152/jn.00754.2009

Cited by 9 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 31 publications

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“…In conclusion, by manipulating the verbal context, we showed that recovery of neural olfactory representation depends on the available lexical information. These findings are in line with a large set of data suggesting that contextual and verbal information present during odor encoding is a prominent factor in the emergence of olfactory representations [Ayabe‐Kanamura et al, ; Bensafi et al, ; Bulsing et al, ; Dalton, ; de Araujo et al, ; Distel and Hudson, ; Djordjevic et al, ; Moskowitz, ; Poncelet et al, b]. Odors are generally emitted by a food, flower, place, animal, perfume, cosmetic, or person, and it is of this context that we are aware concurrently with the smell.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 79%

The effect of verbal context on olfactory neural responses

Bensafi

Croy²,

Phillips

et al. 2012

Human Brain Mapping

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Odor names refer usually to "source" object categories. For example, the smell of rose is often described with its source category (flower). However, linguistic studies suggest that odors can also be named with labels referring to categories of "practices". This is the case when rose odor is described with a verbal label referring to its use in fragrance practices ("body lotion," cosmetic for example). It remains unknown whether naming an odor by its practice category influences olfactory neural responses differently than that observed when named with its source category. The aim of this study was to investigate this question. To this end, functional MRI was used in a within-subjects design comparing brain responses to four different odors (peach, chocolate, linden blossom, and rose) under two conditions whereby smells were described either (1) with their source category label (food and flower) or (2) with a practice category label (body lotion). Both types of labels induced activations in secondary olfactory areas (orbitofrontal cortex), whereas only the source label condition induced activation in the cingulate cortex and the insula. In summary, our findings offer a new look at olfactory perception by indicating differential brain responses depending on whether odors are named according to their source or practice category.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 79%

The effect of verbal context on olfactory neural responses

Bensafi

Croy²,

Phillips

et al. 2012

Human Brain Mapping

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“…This phenomenon is mainly interpreted as modality-specific tuning of the sensory cortex as a result of conditioning, which allows enhanced encoding of the emotionally and motivationally significant stimulus (Weinberger, 2004). Consistent with this, recent studies on chemosensory event-related potentials (ERP) have shown a modulation of ERP components as early as the N1 by pain expectancy, supporting an effect of salience on the very first sensory processing levels (Bulsing et al, 2007, 2010). In our study, the differential response was more pronounced in the right POC, which might result from the right-sided olfactory stimulation and subsequent ipsilateral projections into the POC (Gottfried, 2006).…”

Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 54%

The scent of salience — Is there olfactory-trigeminal conditioning in humans?

et al. 2013

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Pavlovian fear conditioning has been thoroughly studied in the visual, auditory and somatosensory domain, but evidence is scarce with regard to the chemosensory modality. Under the assumption that Pavlovian conditioning relies on the supra-modal mechanism of salience attribution, the present study was set out to attest the existence of chemosensory aversive conditioning in humans as a specific instance of salience attribution. fMRI was performed in 29 healthy subjects during a differential aversive conditioning paradigm. Two odors (rose, vanillin) served as conditioned stimuli (CS), one of which (CS+) was intermittently coupled with intranasally administered CO2. On the neural level, a robust differential response to the CS+ emerged in frontal, temporal, occipito-parietal and subcortical brain regions, including the amygdala. These changes were paralleled by the development of a CS+-specific connectivity profile of the anterior midcingulate cortex (aMCC), which is a key structure for processing salience information in order to guide adaptive response selection. Increased coupling could be found between key nodes of the salience network (anterior insula, neo-cerebellum) and sensorimotor areas, representing putative input and output structures of the aMCC for exerting adaptive motor control. In contrast, behavioral and skin conductance responses did not show significant effects of conditioning, which has been attributed to contingency unawareness. These findings imply substantial similarities of conditioning involving chemosensory and other sensory modalities, and suggest that salience attribution and adaptive control represent a general, modality-independent principle underlying Pavlovian conditioning.

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“…‘therapeutic’) [35] and [36]. More surprisingly, however, we also found that this same odorant characterization significantly and persistently increased airway inflammation among individuals who were led to believe that it could induce asthma symptoms.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 55%

Asthma and odors: The role of risk perception in asthma exacerbation

Jaén

Dalton

2014

Journal of Psychosomatic Research

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Objective Fragrances and strong odors have been characterized as putative triggers that may exacerbate asthma symptoms and many asthmatics readily avoid odors and fragranced products. However, the mechanism by which exposure to pure, non-irritating odorants can elicit an adverse reaction in asthmatic patients is still unclear and may involve both physiological and psychological processes. The aim of this study was to investigate how beliefs about an odors relationship to asthmatic symptoms could affect the physiological and psychological ‘ responses of asthmatics. Methods Asthmatics classified as ‘moderate-persistent’, according to NIH criteria, were exposed for 15 mi to a fragrance which was described either as eliciting or alleviating asthma symptoms. During exposure, participants were asked to rate odor intensity, perceived irritation and subjective annoyance while physiological parameters such as electrocardiogram, respiratory rate, and end tidal carbon dioxide (etCO2) were recorded. Before, immediately after, and at 2 and 24 h post-exposure, participants were required to subjectively assess their asthma symptom status using a standardized questionnaire. We also measured asthma status at each of those time points using objective parameters of broncho-constriction (spirometry) and measures of airway inflammation (exhaled nitric oxide, FeNO). Results Predictably, manipulations of perceived risk altered both the quality ratings of the fragrance as well as the reported levels of asthma symptoms. Perceived risk also modulated the inflammatory airway response. Conclusions Expectations elicited by smelling a perceived harmful odor may affect airway physiology and impact asthma exacerbations.

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Irritancy Expectancy Alters Odor Perception: Evidence From Olfactory Event-Related Potential Research

Cited by 9 publications

References 31 publications

The effect of verbal context on olfactory neural responses

The effect of verbal context on olfactory neural responses

The scent of salience — Is there olfactory-trigeminal conditioning in humans?

Asthma and odors: The role of risk perception in asthma exacerbation

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