A Study of the Effect of Fragrances on the Impression Created by Men's Voices in the Minds of Female Subjects

We focused on a man's voice as an element of his impression to learn if fragrance can enhance a man's charm for women. We evaluated the effect of our created fragrances on female subjects hearing a man's voice. We used six voices whose pitches were mechanically converted from one person's voice because it simplified the parameters of composing voices. Under nonperfume conditions we found that female subjects' preferences for and impressions of a man's voice were different, depending on the pitch of the voice. We prepared men's fragrances for the experiment. Thirty-four aroma raw materials were selected based on literature and folklore in which psychological effects were expected. An expert panel chose six raw materials which would suit men's positive image by means of sensory estimation. Among them, we found that Lmuscone had a strong image of elation and charm. We prepared three men's fragrances for a body care product including L-muscone and other fragrances as raw materials. We chose Floral Sweet type and Citrus Musk type. These fragrances have a high preference and positive image for both men and women. It was found the effect of improving sawayakasa in Japanese tended to be of higher fundamental-frequency male voices in the case of using Citrus Musk fragrance, compared with non-perfume conditions. Floral Sweet fragrance showed similar tendency in cases of lower fundamental-frequency voices. Furthermore, the evaluation result of female subjects' own feelings during voice examination showed that the developed fragrances improved feelings of irritation, relief, vividness and excitement with statistically significant difference.