Introduction
Everyday, humans are exposed to a range of odors in their environment (e.g., stench of garbage, waft of freshly baked bread in the supermarket, or perfume of a potential suitor), which influence their mood and behavior (Havlicek et al., 2010). The aim of this entry is to review the influence of naturally occurring olfactory compounds on sexual arousal and behavior. While exogenous odors (perfumes and colognes) seem to influence affect and sexual attraction (see Doty, 2010), it remains less clear whether naturally occurring odor compounds – i.e., those present in human body odor – influence sexual arousal and behavior (Stevenson 2010; Doty, 2010). Although few naturally occurring odor compounds are suggested to play a role in human sexual arousal (e.g., 16-androstenes, estratetraenol, and copulin), this entry will focus on the 16-androstenes (i.e., a group of organic odor compounds [steroids]), as these have been most heavily studied (Oren et al., 2019). As such, first the...
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Saluja, S., Stevenson, R.J. (2023). Sexual Arousal and Olfactory Stimuli. In: Shackelford, T.K. (eds) Encyclopedia of Sexual Psychology and Behavior. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-08956-5_2148-1
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