This subject is usually of great interest to my students! Odors do have the
power to evoke memories (and feelings). Since the sense of smell utilizes a
very direct route to the brain (like a hotline that gets infomation from the
nose to the brain's ancient limbic centers (associated with memory and
emotion) we seem to have a remarkable ability to associate certain smells
with vivid personal episodes. To this day, when I smell cigars, I visualize
my grandfather, dressed in his Sunday best(he only smoked cigars on Sunday).
I also "see" my grandmother cooking Sunday dinner at the stove. The whole
scene suddenly appears!!
Janice Gearan, Assoc. Professor
Mt. Wachusett Community College
Gardner, MA
-----Original Message-----
From: Kirsten Rewey [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
Sent: Thursday, October 26, 2000 8:16 AM
To: TIPsters
Subject: RE: Holiday odors and mood, memories
>===== Original Message From "Mark S. Schmidt" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
=====
Colleagues,
I just got a request from a local reporter asking if I knew
of any research on a possible association between Holiday
odors (odors associated with the Fall holidays of
Thanksgiving & Christmas) and emotions and memory. The request was
a little vague, but I gathered that she is doing a piece on how the
smells of Fall and the holidays might affect emotions and
bring back fond memories of childhood Christmases, etc. I took a
chance and said I'd try to find something for her. Is anyone familiar
with any research along these lines? I remember a little about
Robert Baron's work on odors and helping behavior, but that's about
it. I'm going to hit the databases tomorrow but any help that the
wise sages of TIPS could provide would be greatly appreciated!! I'll
share what I find with the list. Thanks!
Mark
Mark -
I don't have any research on odors & memories, per se, but I think there are
two approaches you could take.
First the cognitive concepts of encoding specificity and retrieval cues
could
apply. The retrieval cue would be the odor (cues us to remember the event,
emotion, or holiday). And if the cue is really distinctive and hasn't been
associated with other memories, then the cue should help us recall a
specific
event (i.e., be encoding specific).
Second (and I think more probable), the odor-event association may be
classically conditioned, where the odor is the CS and the event is the
US/UCS.
Hope this helps!
Kirsten
Kirsten L. Rewey
Department of Psychology
St. Mary's University of Minnesota
700 Terrace Heights, Box 1464
Winona, Minnesota 55987
Office: (507) 457-6991
Fax: (507) 457-1633
