The muted sense: neurocognitive limitations of olfactory language

Abstract

Most people find it profoundly difficult to name familiar smells. This difficulty persists even though perceptual odor processing and visual object naming are unimpaired, implying deficient sensory-specific interactions with the language system. In this article, we synthesize recent behavioral and neuroimaging data to develop a biologically informed framework for olfactory lexical processing in the human brain. Our central premise is that the difficulty in naming common objects through olfactory (compared to visual) stimulation is the end result of cumulative effects occurring at three successive stages of the olfactory language pathway: object perception, lexical-semantic integration, and verbalization. Understanding the neurocognitive mechanisms by which the language network interacts with olfaction can yield unique insights into the elusive nature of olfactory naming.

Olfactory Functions in Adults With Autism Spectrum Disorders

“…It is well established that identification of familiar odors is a highly effortful task that poses demands on lexical access and verbalization (Olofsson & Gottfried, 2015). Notably, when retrieval demands are lessened, both groups benefited positively and to a similar extent from provision of retrieval cues.…”

Smell Is Coded in Grammar and Frequent in Discourse: Cha'palaa Olfactory Language in Cross‐Linguistic Perspective

“…In the domain of olfaction, universalist proposals are also beginning to be challenged by studies of diverse, lesser‐known languages from around the world. Claims that smell is universally impossible to describe abstractly (Sperber :115–16; Olofsson and Gottfried ; Yeshurun and Sobel ), and the related implication that olfactory language will be universally minimal across cultures (Lawless and Engen ; Stoddart ; Ackerman ; Wilson and Stevenson ; Olofsson and Gottfried ) are being confronted by research on the Aslian languages of the Malay Peninsula (Burenhult and Majid ; Tufvesson ; Wnuk and Majid ; Majid and Burenhult ; Majid and Kruspe ), among other languages with extensive abstract smell lexicons from northern Mexico (O'Meara and Majid ) to Africa (e.g., van Beek ; Blench and Longtau ; Hombert ; Storch and Vossen ), and Amazonian South America (Shepard ). These findings suggest—as has long been argued in sensory anthropology (e.g., Stoller ; Howes ; Classen ; Howes )—that there is not a universal, biologically determined orientation to perceptual experience, but rather that sensory cultures are diverse (or feature different sensory “models”; Classen ) .…”

Autism Spectrum Disorder: Sniffing Out a New Biomarker

“…A unique aspect of olfaction is its relative separation from linguistic processing [5,6]. Aromas are notoriously difficult to identify and name [7].…”

“…To begin with, the anatomical connections between the olfactory system and the language network are minimal at best [6]. For example, in stark contrast to the visual system, where information about objects is relayed directly to the language network [8], 'olfactory objects' are relayed to regions of the brain critical for memory, emotion and social interaction [5,6].…”

“…For example, in stark contrast to the visual system, where information about objects is relayed directly to the language network [8], 'olfactory objects' are relayed to regions of the brain critical for memory, emotion and social interaction [5,6]. Thus, olfactory information has a 'fast track' to limbic networks regulating affect and emotion, but poor access to regions of the brain subserving language.…”