Smell and Taste Clinic, Department of Otorhinolaryngology, TU Dresden, Germany; Institute of Psychology, University of Wroclaw, Poland.
Department of Psychotherapy and Psychosomatic Medicine, TU Dresden, Germany.
Physiol Behav. 2021 Sep 1;238:113458. doi: 10.1016/j.physbeh.2021.113458. Epub 2021 May 23.
The existence of pheromones in humans is controversial, partly because of definitional difficulties and partly because of the question of possible chemical substances. The synthetic compound Methyl dihydrojasmonate (Hedione) is potent to bind to vomeronasal-type 1 receptors (VN1R1s) and activate limbic areas of the brain in a sex-specific manner. However, one of the most important definitional points for a human pheromone effect has not yet been investigated, i.e., whether smelling Hedione, a model of pheromone, has a behavioral effect. We tested in females whether Hedione leads to altered perception of male social stimuli. Each of the included women were sensitive to Hedione and were tested around the time of ovulation in three consecutive sessions, during each they were exposed to either Hedione or Phenylethyl alcohol or Odorless air. We measured the speed of male face recognition (implicit priming task) and collected ratings of facial attractiveness and likeability of men (explicit task). Only about half of the women tested were sensitive to Hedione. Those women did not show any effect of Hedione exposure in the implicit priming task and moderate, but non-significant effects in the explicit task. We therefore assume that Hedione is not a potent model of pheromone in humans and this observation may be due to the fact that the artificially produced substance is not suited for signaling the proximity of other humans. Furthermore, the high rate of Hedione-specific anosmia leads to the hypothesis that a substantial proportion of individuals has a poor V1NR1 receptor expression.
人类是否存在信息素存在争议，部分原因是定义上的困难，部分原因是可能存在化学物质的问题。合成化合物甲基二氢茉莉酮酸酯（hedione）能与犁鼻器型 1 受体（vn1r1s）强力结合，并以性别特异性的方式激活大脑的边缘区域。然而，对于人类信息素效应最重要的定义之一尚未得到研究，即嗅闻信息素模型 hedione 是否会产生行为效应。我们在女性中测试了 hedione 是否会导致对男性社会刺激的感知改变。每个女性都对 hedione 敏感，并在三个连续的测试中处于排卵期前后进行测试，在每个测试中，她们暴露于 hedione、苯乙醇或无味空气中。我们测量了男性面孔识别的速度（内隐启动任务），并收集了对男性面孔吸引力和喜欢程度的评分（外显任务）。只有大约一半的女性对 hedione 敏感。这些女性在内隐启动任务中没有表现出 hedione 暴露的任何影响，而在外显任务中则表现出适度但无统计学意义的影响。因此，我们假设 hedione 不是人类信息素的有效模型，这种观察结果可能是由于人工合成物质不适合用于信号其他人类的接近。此外，hedione 特异性嗅觉缺失的高发生率导致假设相当一部分个体的 v1nr1 受体表达较差。
