Humans can tract scent very easily however, we also adapt to scents very quickly. Olfactory adaptation explains why we can smell something originally and then we become used to the smell.Just like the fact that when someone comes to your house and says it smells like...waffles for example, but you can't smell it?? You may have noticed that if you leave the house for more than a week (college students can probably relate best to this) that you do actually smell what your house smells like but then you become used to it very quickly and no longer can smell it. This is just like how you typically can not smell your own bad breath or your own bad body odor.
This is very interesting! I have never thought that we could adapt our senses to familiar environments. It's almost as if our olfactory sense "turns off" to familiar smells because we become used to them. I'm glad that doesn't happen with our favorite foods!
ReplyDeleteA long time ago I worked at an animal shelter in the spay/neuter clinic. We worked a lot with feral cat colonies. We would get about ten intact male cats and ten intact female cats per spay/neuter day. If you have ever been around an adult intact male cat then you know that they stink! I became so used to that smell that I didn't even notice how awful my scrubs stunk at the end of the day. Despite not noticing the odor, I KNEW that my clothes stunk and would immediately change and shower at the end of the day. It is so interesting that we can get used to the way something smells even when the smell is absolutely awful! I no longer work in animal shelters and I have had major sinus surgery since then. I now smell everything around me. I detected two small laundry fires, involving industrial dryers in a veterinary clinic, at my last job before the smoke detector ever went off. No one else could smell the smoke and they thought I was crazy. The first fire's smoke was actually contained in the drop ceiling above the dryers and behind a closed fireproof door and I was still able to smell it. It is amazing how much the sinus surgery improved my sense of smell. I think they transplanted some olfactory receptors from a Bloodhound in my nose!
ReplyDeleteHey Madison!
ReplyDeleteVery interesting post! Some people think I'm going crazy because I can't smell my house lol It's cool that our noses adapt to smells that we're so used to and to just "turn off", similar to what Hannah said, to the point where we can't smell it anymore. Great post :)
I always thought about this! My grandmom's house always had a particular scent. When we would smell something from her house we always said "this smells like grandmom". When I moved out of my parents house, and into my grandmom's I forgot what my grandmoms "scent" is, because it is my scent too! My siblings always tell me "you smell like grandmom", but I can't smell that anymore.
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