The average woman will spend approximately $55,000 in a lifetime on hair care products and treatments. While many people choose their products based on their hair needs (such as color treatments or anti-frizz), many choose their products based on the scent.
The smell of your hair could impact your mood throughout the day.
How does hair scent affect mood? Keep reading to find out! We’ll discuss everything you need to know about how pleasant scents can impact your mood.
Then, you might reconsider your usual hair care products the next time you go shopping.
How Do We Detect Scents?
When we breathe in, the olfactory cleft within the nose draws odor molecules in. These molecules then dissolve and penetrate the mucous membrane or olfactory epithelium.
Turbinates, or boney cushions, inside the nose help bring in air. These bony cushions help direct and filter airflow before sensing the odor molecules.
Then, cilia, which are hair-like projects attached to receptor blinds, bind with the dissolved odor molecules. Your body will generate an impulse that will travel through the olfactory nerves. Once they reach the olfactory bulb in the brain, our bodies will process the scent.
That’s how we detect scents!
How Does Scent Affect the Brain?
The hippocampus is a crucial region within the brain. A part of the limbic system, the hippocampus is associated with our emotions and reactions.
The hippocampus is also responsible for storing declarative and spatial memories.
Declarative memories are related to facts and previous events. Spatial memory is associated with pathways and routes.
Our short-term memories live within the hippocampus, too. Then, they’re turned into long-term memories and stored away.
Since smell processing is closely connected to the hippocampus, our emotions and scents are closely connected. Our sense of smell can help us re-experience certain memories. While we re-experience these memories, the emotions we once associated with that situation rises to the surface of the mine.
As a result, scents affect mood by triggering the emotions we associate with past experiences.
How Do Scents Trigger Emotions?
Now that you understand a little more about how the brain processes pleasant scents, let’s talk about emotions.
We almost always associate a memory with an emotion. For example, maybe you baked cookies from scratch with a parent as a child. The smell of freshly baked cookies today can still remind you of childhood days back then.
We often store memories away with an automatic emotion attached to it.
When we experience a scent that’s already stored in our memory, or brain makes the connection. This causes recollections and the emotions we’ve experienced in the past.
Our memories and the emotions attached to them are often unique.
For example, the smell of freshly baked cookies might not remind you of your childhood or a parent. Instead, it might remind you of your college days, making cookies with friends.
The emotions you experience as a result of scented smells depend on your memories.
How Do Scents Affect Our Mood?
Think about it this way: would you feel better standing in a room that smells like garbage, or one that smells like vanilla?
Smells can affect mood. In addition to triggering certain memories, scents can also impact the brain by affecting the areas associated with emotions and learning.
As more people learn how scent can affect mood, many people have started investing in essential oils. Over 200 scented oils have created a market that exceeded $7.51 billion in 2018. And many are using a moodboard to express their feelings.
Essential oils are anti-viral anti-bacterial, and antifungal. Many of these oils are found in our favorite products, including our shampoo and conditioner. By inhaling these scents, you can experience certain changes in the body, such as:
Some scents can boost your energy while others can help you relax.
Here are a few example scents you might consider trying the next time you shop for products. You can also experience the uplifting effects of this styling compound as well.
Lemon
When you smell lemon, you might think about a clean kitchen or a delicious meal.
Lemon is a scent that promotes concentration. It also has a calming, clarifying effect. If you’re feeling anxious, angry, or exhausted, lemon can clear those negative energies.
Lemon is also used as an antiviral. Its antibacterial properties make it an ideal ingredient in many cleaning products and medicines. For example, lemon is ideal for fighting sore throats and colds by increasing immunity and improving circulation.
If your hair smells like lemon, you might feel calmed or cleansed. Remember, the emotions you feel often depend on the memories you associate with the scent.
Lavender
Like lemon, lavender is a scent that’s often associated with a calm atmosphere. This scent is ideal if you want to control or relieve emotional stress.
Lavender has a soothing effect on the nerves. As a result, hair care products with lavender can help relieve your nervous tension.
Lavender also helps fight depression, headaches, and migraines. If you experience a lot of stress in your life, try a product that contains plenty of sweet-smelling lavender.
Jasmine
Like lemon and lavender, jasmine is a scent that’s used to calm the nerves.
It’s also used as an antidepressant. Jasmine contains uplifting capabilities that help it trigger optimism, confidence, and a sense of revitalized energies.
Cinnamon
If you’re not a fan of floral scents, try rich, earthly cinnamon instead.
Cinnamon is a stimulating scent. It can help fight mental fatigue. As a result, cinnamon is ideal if you need to improve your focus and concentration.
Peppermint
To sharpen your focus and clear your mind, try a product with peppermint.
This scent is great if you need to brainstorm new ideas or think clearly. It also helps invigorate the mind, boost energy levels, and increase concentration.
Lock onto That Shampoo Scent: Understand How Hair Scent Can Affect Mood
Can the scent of your hair affect mood? Yes! Changing your hair care products can make you feel calm, concentrated, or uplifted.
It all depends on the emotions and memories you associate with each scent.
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