Individual significance of olfaction: development of a questionnaire

Abstract

Clinical experience shows that the individual significance of olfactory function varies between subjects. In order to estimate these individual differences we developed a questionnaire to study the subjective importance of the sense of smell. Questions were arranged within three subscales: association with olfactory sensations, application of the sense of smell, and the readiness to draw consequences from the olfactory perception. The questionnaire was shown to be time efficient, suitable for normosmic subjects and patients with hyposmia or anosmia. It exhibited a good internal reliability (Cronbach's Alpha = 0.77). First results in 123 subjects indicate that the subjective importance of the sense of smell stays at the same level throughout life-span despite of a decreased olfactory sensitivity. Furthermore, women reported a higher importance of olfaction. It is hoped that this questionnaire will contribute to clarify, for example, cross-cultural differences in the perception of odours.

Studies on Olfactory Dreaming

“…In this way, it was possible to achieve a high return rate. Future studies, however, might also benefit from the use of more established questionnaires, for example, the "Impact of Odor scale" (Wrzesniewski et al 1999), "Importance of Olfaction Questionnaire" (Croy et al 2009), and the "Vividness of Olfactory Imagery Questionnaire" (Gilbert et al 1998). …”

What Makes a Better Smeller?

“…This idea has a long history in Western thought as Classen (1997, p. 4) points out: ''men tended to be linked with the 'rational' senses of sight and hearing, and women with the 'corporeal' senses of smell, taste and touch.'' This belief has wide-spread acceptance today too: Women rate their own sense of smell higher than men do (Wysocki & Gilbert, 1989); they say smell is more important to them (Croy, Buschhu¨ter, Seo, Negoias, & Hummel, 2010;Seo et al, 2011); and that they are generally more attentive and interested in odors (Ferdenzi, Coureaud, Camos, & Schaal, 2008;Havlicek et al, 2008). On the flip side, women also report being more disturbed by odors (Nordin, Bende, & Millqvist, 2004;Nordin, Palmquist, Bende, & Millqvist, 2013); and when they suffer from an olfactory dysfunction, women feel their quality of life is affected much more than men do (Frasnelli & Hummel, 2005).…”

Olfactometric assessment - where do we stand today?

“…The chemosensory event-related potentials, odor-induced changes of the electroencephalogram (EEG), the electroolfactogram and imaging techniques complete the olfactory function evaluation. Because olfaction has an important influence over the patients' quality of life, questionnaires are also used 1,2 . In the USA, olfaction is evaluated mainly through psychophysical methods.…”