We're all attracted to people all the time. What is it that attracts us to others? And
what do others find attractive about you? These are some of the questions our team is
going to try and answer in this series of videos. With millions of people to choose
from, finding that perfect someone shouldn't be that difficult. But the media, social pressures
and human nature itself have turned it into a mystery. We're surrounded by manipulated
images, celebrity and glossy perfection. We're given rules about dating through books, websites
and the press. They all pressure us to conform to an ideal of what is attractive. [music]
But what's the truth? It's time for science to tackle the subject. Through a series of
experiments, our team are going to piece together some of the clues to this enormously complex
phenomenon and in these videos they will explore the science of attraction.
We grow accustomed to the things we experience every day, they become reliable and comforting.
Smell is a part of that; we all have smells that remind us of places and people, in particular
our partners. But Smell may also play a role in our initial
attraction to a particular person. [Music] In this video we're going to make
10 young people smell each others stinky sweaty clothes.
>>That is disgusting
To find out how important smell is when it comes to attraction.
>>Can't believe you got it wrong! [Laughter]
But first, here's Kat
It is thought that our brains are hardwired to associate different scents with different
feelings and emotions so the smell of someone we care about should be imprinted firmly in
our minds, firmly enough to indentify it at least. That smell may actually play a part
in the initial attraction we feel towards that person. Brits spend 640 million pounds
on perfumes so clearly we care how we smell. Perfumes and colognes aside, do we have a
genetic smell that others will be attracted to?
[Music] To test out the impact smell has on relationships we have recruited five young
couples and are going to get them really stinky by taking them paintballing. Hosting the experiment
will be Charlie and he's going to explain to the guys exactly what's going to happen
Hi everyone thanks for coming along to take part in our smell experiment. Now for this
to work we need to get you really stinky so we're going to send you off for a spot of
paintball. [laughter] Before we send you out into battle we need
to set some test conditions. On the table there are some clean white t-shirts and we
need you to wear them under your kits.
After the game when the shirt are really starting to pong we're going to mix them up and get
you to have a good smell of each one [laughter] sorry but it is in the name of science. Then
we'll ask you which smell you were most attracted to and which you think belonged to your partner.
Good luck and just have some fun.
Once they collected their brand new t-shirts we made sure the subjects were nice and clean
creating an old factory blank canvas without any deodorants or perfumes on their bodies.
We also provided the young lovers with brand new paintballing armour and outfits, never
before worn and the stage is set for a pongy paintball session.
>>OK ladies and gents, if you would like to come and get your weapon from the rack. OK
everyone make your guns hot. 3, 2, 1, game on!
We put them through a punishing hour long paintball marathon and with them trying to
avoid paint pellets travelling up to speeds of 200 miles an hour, they were guaranteed
to work up a good sweat.
[Laughter] >>Hectic, hectic, crazy, boiling and sweaty,
you don't want to know.
>>I'm sweating like a pig, [laughter] which is probably not good for a girl.
>>You lot told me it was going to be fun, I am hot, I stink, I don't do stinky, I'm
a female, you know, I got pride.
>>Oh that was brilliant man, great, great fitness and everything man you got to be fit
to do this.
We separated the reeking t-shirts into two sets, one for the boys and one for the girls,
gave them a number from one to five and hung them on two separate washing lines. We told
them to pick a t-shirt that they are most attracted to and then choose a t-shirt that
they think belongs to their partner. It's time for them to have a sniff.
>>Oh that smells horrible
>>That smells quite nice
>>Oh that one smells really different, oh this is well hard.
>>That one is meant to be a girls?
>>That one is still soaking
>>Sure these aint the blokes ones? [laughter]
>>This one don't smell too good
>>One and two I feel sorry for you
>>These aren't smelling too fresh
>>ohhwee
>>That's quite a filthy smell
>>They all smell of mud
>>That is disgusting
>>Ahh
>>That's not as bad.
OK so let's see the results, first we'll start with which t-shirts they were most attracted
to, and surprisingly it's not always their partner's one.
>>The t-shirt I was most attracted to was number one, I thought it was more or less
a smell I would like, want my girlfriend to smell like.
>>The t-shirt I was most attracted to was number three, it smelt the nicest the freshest
and just the cleanest smell really.
>>I was attracted to t-shirt number three because I thought it smelt the freshest out
of all of them.
>>The t-shirt number I was attracted to was number five. It actually smelt the nicest.
>>My favourite t-shirt, it smelt the nicest, it was a nice manly smell and it was number
three.
>> I was attracted to t-shirt number one because it just smelt sweet, it smelt like, it smelt
like a lady so.
>>Alright, ok.
>>I was most attracted to t-shirt number three it smelt the most clean
>>I chose t-shirt number four, for both it was the one I was attracted to and because
I thought it was Amy's t-shirt. I kind of recognised the smell and I think the familiarity
was why I found it attractive.
>>I chose t-shirt number five as the one I was most attracted to and the one that I thought
was Alex because it didn't smell of a lot and I know that he doesn't sweat and it had
a hint of his smell in it and I know his smell pretty well.
>>I was most attracted to t-shirt number two, it didn't have any bad smells, it smelt quite
nice, so I'm hoping it was a bit like Jodie's smell.
Interestingly very few of our test subjects chose their partners t-shirt as the one they
were most attracted to. When it came to the girls choice of which t-shirt had the most
attractive smell there was one stand out result that Kat will now explain.
Ross was chosen as having the most attractive smell by a whopping 80 percent of the girls.
Now he was just as sweaty as the others and didn't have any cologne on so it was literally
his natural smell that was coming through. He may have a particular strong immune system
or it may have been more varied than the other guys. This could have been communicated via
his smell and this could make him more attractive.
Now let's take a look at which t-shirts they have picked when asked which one belonged
to their partners.
>>The t-shirt I thought was Rachel's, was number two, because it's quite familiar, the
others, I didn't really fancy them compared to that one.
>>I think t-shirt number four belonged to Ross because whenever he goes to play football
or stuff like that he never really smells of anything. It had bit of a familiar smell,
so.
>>I think number four belonged to Jake because I just got a gut feeling when I smelt it,
I could sort of smell him on it.
>>The t-shirt I chose for Sian was the same one I felt most attracted to which is number
five.
>>Yours is number one, I just know your smell too well and it was a little strong. I love
you babe.
>>I'm still not even a hundred percent sure myself, I'm going to go and check it out because
I'm not sure about them results. Number four.
>>I chose t-shirt number one as Pete's t-shirt it was the most wet and he had been running
around a lot so I thought he might have got quite sweaty and I did recognise his smell,
although I don't think I could exactly describe it in words.
>>I was attracted to t-shirt number four, I think, well because I think that was Amy's
t-shirt and it was the most familiar smell.
>>I chose number five as the one that I was the most attracted to and the one that I thought
was Alex because its quite hard to describe Alex's smell but I don't really know it just
smelt of him.
>>I picked number three as being Jodie's, it just had a stronger scent of Jodie on it,
it was just like a gut feeling, so.
Let's take a closer look at the results.
The Boys were only able to identify their girlfriends 20% of the time. However the girls
did much better than the boys identifying their partners with an accuracy of almost
70 percent. Evidence suggests that women have a much more acute sense of smell especially
when ovulating. Also girls wear more perfume or scents than boys so the lads won't have
been exposed to their partners scent as much.
>>Yeah, I knew it was right.
>>Oh my god, you're rubbish, you don't know me [laughter]
>>I can't believe you got it wrong [laughter]
>>Good, good I knew it, I knew it.
>>What?
>>What? Are you serious? No that's wrong, I was right [laughter]
Some of the genes that are involved in making our immune system work also control aspects
of our body odour so to some extent our scent gives away the genetic make up of our immune
system. If a persons make up is too similar to our own then that person will smell less
attractive to us. However, the odour of someone whose immune system make up is different,
will seem more appealing. The combination of different genetics will give any offspring
a stronger immune system.
>>To find out more and test out our chat up line generator go to scienceofattraction.co.uk