Scents to make us feel good!

When we’re mingling we’re often cooking and eating.  How do the food smells we’re likely to encounter influence our time with others?

• Scents that make us feel nostalgic improve our mood, whether those scents are from food or something else. They also boost our self-esteem, optimism, and social connections to others.
• Sweet orange, that’s the scent of the fruit that we normally eat, reduces anxiety levels. So does the smell of vanilla.
• The scents of lemon and mango are relaxing.
• The smell of rosemary enhances memory performance. So do the scents of sage and peppermint.  Smelling peppermint and, separately, smelling rosemary have both been linked to feeling more alert.
• Smelling coffee makes us more alert and improves our performance of analytical tasks.
• The scent of chocolate and also of peppermint can improve performance on more mundane cognitive-type work (and peppermint can also help with physical tasks).
• Lemon boosts mood and performance on cognitive/mental tasks.
• We feel more energetic when we smell grapefruit, tangerines, and peppermint.
• The scent of green apple makes a space seem larger.
• We feel thinner when we smell lemon and heavier when the scent of vanilla is in the air.