CABI Blog

My colleagues and I have blogged about how eating less meat could reduce one's carbon footprint. But how to motivate people to do this is a problem – people like meat. Here is a reason for men to consider giving up meat – I stumbled over it while searching on Nutrition and Food Sciences Database. Could be a fruitful area of research to pursue? Could it also work for women?


" Title
The effect of meat consumption on body odor attractiveness.
Authors
Havlicek, J.; Lenochova, P.
Journal
Chemical Senses
2006
Vol.
31
No.
8
pp.
747-752

Abstract.

Axillary body odor is individually specific and potentially a rich source of information about its producer. Odor
individuality partly results from genetic individuality, but the
influence of ecological factors such as eating habits are another main
source of odor variability. However, we know very little about how particular dietary components shape our body odor. Here we tested the effect of red meat consumption on body odor attractiveness. We used a balanced within-subject experimental design. Seventeen male odor donors were on "meat" or "nonmeat" diet for 2 weeks wearing axillary pads to collect body odor during the final 24 h of the diet. Fresh odor samples were assessed for their pleasantness, attractiveness, masculinity, and intensity by 30 women not using hormonal contraceptives. We repeated the same procedure a month later with the same odor donors, each on the opposite diet than before. Results of repeated measures analysis of variance showed that the odor
of donors when on the nonmeat diet was judged as significantly more
attractive, more pleasant, and less intense. This suggests that red
meat consumption has a negative impact on perceived body odor hedonicity."

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