How Scent Can Affect Perceived Anger Levels

By Steve Wang

Human perception is an important part of all our lives. From what we do and how we act, it affects all of us consciously and subconsciously. If we can control perception, we will be able to somewhat control behavior. This skill could also be used to improve communication. A sensory perception that I find very fascinating is smell because some smells make my head hurt. However, it is a very important part of our lives. For example, some people might like to put some scents into dehumidifiers. One of them is lemongrass. According to (Healthline Editorial Team, 2020), lemongrass is a tropical, grassy plant used in cooking and herbal medicine. They also mentioned that lemongrass essential oil is a popular tool in aromatherapy to help relieve stress, anxiety, and depression. This experiment researches the relationship between smell and perceptions of anger. This would influence the perceptions of anger because lemongrass is know for its calming.

To test how effective manipulating the input of smell could be used to manipilate anger levels, the researcher decided to test if the smell of lemongrass could reduce anger and make people think more calmly. The expected result of the group of people that were exposed to the smell of lemongrass would reduce their anticipation of becoming angry. The researcher did this experiment by going out and asking random people the same simple question: “假如你的朋友跟你有約 但是他卻沒有出現也找不到他 你有多生氣。 0 不生气。 5 非常生气。” In English, it roughly translates: “If you and your friend have agreed to go out, and they did not show and you cannot contact/find them. How angry would you be if 0 is not angry and 5 is very angry. If the interviewee asks for more information, I will tell them the friend is very close to them and they have agreed to go out for fun in this example. The researcher asked 30 people after applying 10 drops of lemongrass to his palm and applying it on his hands and neck. There was no elaborate plan to control what scent the people smelt but it serves to help test how effective scent is as a tool for shaping perception. Mainly, this research would test organization in the process of perception because this is the step that our brain prcess sensory input and makes meaning out of them. The experiment described above would test how the scent of lemongrass would affect how the brain organizes information. Here is a photo of the lemongrass used:

Here is the product page. It was very potent after applying the lemongrass the smell was very suffocating for the researcher.

The respondent's gender and answers were recorded. In total, 60 answers were collected. 0 means not angry and 5 means very angry.

Comparing the results of the experiment group and the control group, there is no obvious difference in the perceived anger levels. Looking closer, it could be seen that people might be slightly less angry when there is the scent of lemongrass. There are more responses for perceived anger level 0 and 2 compared to when the scent of lemongrass is not present. This could have meant that smell does not affect anger that much. However, this could also mean that the experiment should have been conducted differently to get accurate results. For example, the smell of lemongrass might not have been strong enough or people's sensitivity to smells might also have been a differentiating factor. To get a concrete conclusion, another test where the scent of lemongrass is stronger will have to be made. Even so, the researcher suspects that the results will be similar because the smell was quite strong to the experimenter in an indoor environment after the lemongrass was applied and the colleague of the researcher said the smell was obvious after a few seconds so it is reasonable to believe that the experiment subjects could smell it too. From the results, the expected degree of anger imagined between genders seems to be the same. Instead, one thing that can be observed from the results is, most people would not be angry. Instead, most people expressed that they would be worried about their friend first. These two points can be observed from the graph below. In this graph, we are comparing with percentage because there were a total of 38 women asked and 22 men asked and dividing it allowed for a more fair comparison.

To be able to make a concrete conclusion about how effective smell can be used when communicating, another research would have to be done but with a more obvious scent. Nevertheless, from the current results, it can be observed that scent does not play that big of a role in the perceived anger levels. People might be better off using other things like attire to influencing perceptions of anger.

1. Healthline Editorial Team. (2020, April 13). 11 Reasons to Use Lemongrass Essential Oil. Healthline. https://www.healthline.com/health/lemongrass-essential-oil

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