When the scent of a freshly baked cake reminds you of your childhood birthday parties, the smell of homemade soup reminds you of your grandmother, or a certain perfume transports you back in time, it's not by chance! It's because of your olfactory memory.
Olfactory memory is completely personal, unique, and non-transferable, and allows you to relive moments in just a few seconds. Let's tell you a little more about this wonder.
How olfactory memory works
Although in our daily lives we don't take it into account and we prioritize other senses such as sight or hearing, our life would not be the same without the powerful sense of smell. And it is directly linked to memory, so it has a strong connection with emotions and our mood.
Surely you're wondering how smell and memory are connected. Well, through a brain process as complex as it is interesting.
In the nasal cavities are the smell receptors, known as olfactory epithelia, which are responsible for capturing olfactory stimuli and sending a signal to the olfactory bulb; in turn responsible for processing these stimuli and connecting them with different parts of the brain, especially with the limbic system.
The limbic system
The limbic system is a part of the brain that processes emotional information and helps consolidate memories since it has structures specifically dedicated to this. Among them we highlight:
- The amygdala, as it is the organ responsible for associating aromas with emotions.
- And the hippocampus, which relates aromas with memories.
This magnificent combo creates the relevant connections for olfactory memory to work, and so, when we perceive a certain smell, we go back to the place or time when we smelled it for the first time.
As you can see, humans are extraordinary machines, since, although we do not have a sense of smell as developed as that of many animals, we do have the ability to relate those olfactory stimuli to our memory, thus evoking vivid memories.
Smell and memory
Olfactory memory determines the perception we have of people and places, since the emotional effects that smells transmit to us are what determine our reaction.
People begin to incorporate memories into the olfactory memory very very early, so much so that we start doing it when we are in our mother's womb! This makes babies recognize their mother's smell from the very first moment.
Over the years, we perfect our olfactory memory, and it ends up acquiring so much power that it can be responsible for completely changing our mood. In recent years, the great power of smell has been more than demonstrated, which is why techniques such as aromatherapy have emerged that delve into this fascinating world. However, olfactory memory is not only used to evoke pleasant memories; it is also extremely useful in alarming us when faced with a smell that suggests a dangerous situation, such as the smell of burning or putrefaction.
The point here is that olfactory memory belongs entirely to the realm of the subconscious so we regret to inform you that, no matter how hard we try, we cannot eliminate the association of certain smells with moments or people. A nuisance, because we already know that more than one person would like not to have to evoke their ex every time they smell their perfume... 
Perfumes and olfactory memory
Speaking of perfumes, these have a great evocative power, since they are tremendously striking smells for our sense of smell and end up being the ones we identify with and relate to the most. For this reason, when a person regularly uses a certain perfume, they are identified by those around them by that aroma. Thus, even if that perfume is used by someone else, for our olfactory memory, that specific fragrance belongs to them and will lead us to remember it as their own aroma.
As you can see, thanks to olfactory memory,perfumes become our hallmark, what characterizes us, so we shouldn't choose one lightly.
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