Bolanle Akanji
Moderator
Research has found that bad body odour is commonly associated with vulnerability,which arouses concern in others.
In other words, people co-operate more when dealing with someone who smells bad because they feel sorry for them.
Lead author Jeroen Camps and colleagues, from the university KU Leuven in Belgium, said:
'Even though it has been argued that bad scents invoke negative judgments, we argued and demonstrated that a bad body odour elicits feelings of pity in others and increases prosocial behaviour.'
Body odour include underarm sweat, smelly feet, bad breath or other foul-smelling odours.
The research, published online in the Journal of Applied Social Psychology, involved several experiments,all of which led to the same conclusion; a person's unpleasant body odour increases others' helping behaviours toward this person.
In other words, people co-operate more when dealing with someone who smells bad because they feel sorry for them.
Lead author Jeroen Camps and colleagues, from the university KU Leuven in Belgium, said:
'Even though it has been argued that bad scents invoke negative judgments, we argued and demonstrated that a bad body odour elicits feelings of pity in others and increases prosocial behaviour.'
Body odour include underarm sweat, smelly feet, bad breath or other foul-smelling odours.
The research, published online in the Journal of Applied Social Psychology, involved several experiments,all of which led to the same conclusion; a person's unpleasant body odour increases others' helping behaviours toward this person.
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