Scent and Heat!

At this time of year we can become particularly attuned to the smells in our homes and offices, regularly because they’re not very good.

If you actively manage the scents in your home and office now, when it’s a challenge to open the windows and air them out, you can put your olfactory system to work for you, not against you.

Science has shown that:

• Making a space smell good, for example, like an event that you have pleasant memories of, will boost your mood and with it your problem-solving ability, creativity, and ability to get along with others.
• Similarly, when we’re in a space that we think smells clean we’ll be cleaner ourselves (e.g., help keep things tidy), and are also more likely to be fairer, more generous, trusting, and helpful to others.
• A scent that makes us feel nostalgic can also lead us to feel less lonely and boost our self-esteem.
• We’re less anxious when we smell orange, flowers, and vanilla and more relaxed when we’re in an area scented with lemon, mango, and lavender.  And a bonus – lavender can help people who have trouble falling asleep sleep better.
• Smelling lavender has also been tied to trusting others more.
• We get an energy boost, something that often comes in handy around now, after smelling grapefruit, tangerine, peppermint, and eucalyptus.
• And, if you need to get work done during the holidays, scent your workplace with lemon, it’ll enhance both your performance and mood.

As you scent, remember that the merest traces of added smells are best—if people enter a space and mention it’s smell, reduce the amount of scent present—try to create a situation in which even when asked about the smell in an area visitors can’t identify it.

Temperature

If there’s a temperature war over the holidays, pitting the usual residents against guests, remember that our cognitive performance is best when the air temperature is about 70 degrees Fahrenheit (21 degrees Celsius) (actually between 68 and 74 degrees F, 20 and 23 degrees C) and humidity levels are 40 – 70%.  Also, for sleeping, shoot for a temperature of around 65 degrees F (18 degrees C).

At the minimum, optimized brain activity is likely best for smoothing over any hard feelings from the aforementioned temperature debate.