Scent Of A Man: Partner's Smell Lowers Stress Levels In Women

The scent of a romantic partner can help lower stress levels in women, a new study has found.

A study analyzed the effect of scent on a woman’s stress level and found the scent of their male partner had a calming effect. Women who were exposed to their partner’s scent even when highly stressed showed an immediate significant drop in cortisol levels.

The study focused on 96 heterosexual couples. The men in the group were asked to wear a clean t-shirt for 24 hours and were instructed to keep strong smelling things away from the clothing. Deodorants, cigarettes and smelly food were all a no-no for 24 hours. The t-shirts were then frozen to preserve the scent.

The women were then asked to smell a random t-shirt from a pile of worn and unworn clothes. So, they were assigned a t-shirt worn by a stranger or one that was worn by their partner or one that wasn’t worn at all. They were not told which one they had been given.

The women were then subjected to stress. The researchers pulled out the big-guns for this test. The women were subjected to a mock interview and given a mental math task to stress them enough to see a spike in cortisol levels. This was calculated by collecting saliva samples during and after a stress questionnaire. Needless to say, after the questionnaire they were pretty stressed.

Women tend to have a more acute sense of smell than men, so they were recruited as “smellers.”

Some women were able to correctly identify their partner’s shirt from the smell alone and their cortisol levels were found to be the lowest, both before and after the test. This showed the team the stress-reducing benefits of a partner’s scent were strongest when women know what they’re smelling.

Meanwhile, the researchers also found women who smelled a stranger’s shirt showed a spike in cortisol levels. They had higher cortisol levels throughout the stress test.

This could be an evolutionary response that could be triggered by a stranger’s smell. It could be the body’s response to possible danger.

“From a young age, humans fear strangers, especially strange males, so it is possible that a strange male scent triggers the ‘fight or flight’ response that leads to elevated cortisol,” said Marlise Hofer, the study’s lead author and a graduate student in the UBC department of psychology in a press release. “This could happen without us being fully aware of it.”

“Many people wear their partner’s shirt or sleep on their partner’s side of the bed when their partner is away, but may not realize why they engage in these behaviors,” said Hofer. “Our findings suggest that a partner’s scent alone, even without their physical presence, can be a powerful tool to help reduce stress.”

This could be useful in practical stress management in couples who travel a lot, remarked the study’s senior author Frances Chen.

“With globalization, people are increasingly traveling for work and moving to new cities,” said Frances Chen. “Our research suggests that something as simple as taking an article of clothing that was worn by your loved one could help lower stress levels when you’re far from home.”

The study was published this week in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.