Tactile roughness perception in the presence of olfactory and trigeminal stimulants

Abstract

Previous research has shown that odorants consistently evoke associations with textures and their tactile properties like smoothness and roughness. Also, it has been observed that olfaction can modulate tactile perception. We therefore hypothesized that tactile roughness perception may be biased towards the somatosensory connotation of an ambient odorant. We performed two experiments to test this hypothesis. In the first experiment, we investigated the influence of ambient chemosensory stimuli with different roughness connotations on tactile roughness perception. In addition to a pleasant odor with a connotation of softness (PEA), we also included a trigeminal stimulant with a rough, sharp or prickly connotation (Ethanol). We expected that—compared to a No-odorant control condition—tactile texture perception would be biased towards smoothness in the presence of PEA and towards roughness in the presence of Ethanol. However, our results show no significant interaction between chemosensory stimulation and perceived tactile surface roughness. It could be argued that ambient odors may be less effective in stimulating crossmodal associations, since they are by definition extraneous to the tactile stimuli. In an attempt to optimize the conditions for sensory integration, we therefore performed a second experiment in which the olfactory and tactile stimuli were presented in synchrony and in close spatial proximity. In addition, we included pleasant (Lemon) and unpleasant (Indole) odorants that are known to have the ability to affect tactile perception. We expected that tactile stimuli would be perceived as less rough when simultaneously presented with Lemon or PEA (both associated with softness) than when presented with Ethanol or Indole (odors that can be associated with roughness). Again, we found no significant main effect of chemosensory condition on perceived tactile roughness. We discuss the limitations of this study and we present suggestions for future research.

Multisensory contributions to affective touch

“…Below, I briefly review the latest insights concerning the multisensory influences on the pleasantness of affective touch, highlighting the similarities with the already well-established multisensory influences on inanimate touch of surfaces/materials (e.g., Chang, 2010;Demattè, Sanabria, Sugarman, & Spence, 2006;Koijck, Toet, & Van Erp, 2015;Laird, 1932;Sijben, Hensel, Rodriguez-Raecke, & Freiherr, 2021;Spence, 2020b;cf. Özcan, Cupchik, & MULTISENSORY CONTRIBUTIONS TO AFFECTIVE TOUCH 6 Schifferstein, 2017), including cosmetic products, and even one's own hair (Churchill, Meyners, Griffiths, & Bailey, 2009).…”

Roughness perception: A multisensory/crossmodal perspective

“…The absence of an effect for unpleasant odors is somewhat unexpected, given the fact that unpleasant odors have previously been found to bias tactile perception of roughness (Demattè et al, 2006 ) and unpleasantness (Croy et al, 2014 ). (Koijck et al, 2015 , p. 17)…”

“…Koijck et al ( 2015 ) hypothesized that the perception of tactile roughness may be affected by the presence of ambient odour. To test this hypothesis, they conducted two experiments.…”

“…Coffee also rated as more acidic from the rough cup than when tasted from the smooth cup (Carvalho et al, 2020 ). Touch & Olfaction Fabric swatches judged as feeling softer in the presence of a pleasant odor (i.e., lemon or lavender) than in the presence of an unpleasant animal-like odour (Demattè et al, 2006 , though see Koijck et al, 2015 ). Auditory & Taste Bitter taste mapped to rough and low-pitched sounds, whereas sweet tastes mapped to high pitched and smooth sounds (Knöferle et al, 2015 ).…”

How Semantically Labeled Scent-Gender Associations Influence the Evaluations of Scent and Texture

“…For example, previous research on multisensory perception has shown the existence of cross-modal interactions between tactile information and other sensory modalities, including light (e.g., Guest and Spence, 2003 ), sound (e.g., Guest et al, 2002 ; Uchida et al, 2021 ), and taste (e.g., Wang and Spence, 2018 ; Carvalho et al, 2020 ; Pramudya et al, 2020 ). Several studies have specifically shown that olfaction (smell) can also interact with tactile perception (e.g., Laird, 1932 ; Demattè et al, 2006 ; Luisa Demattè et al, 2007 ; Koijck et al, 2015 ). For example, fabrics containing lemon scents are perceived as softer than those containing animal scents ( Demattè et al, 2006 ).…”