Male sexual orientation affects sensitivity to androstenone

Abstract

Androstenone has often been discussed as a human social chemosignal, as it is one of the major contributing substances to the human body odor for which humans possess specific receptors. Here, we investigated whether male sexual orientation influences the perception of androstenone. Sensitivity to androstenone, subjective ratings of intensity, pleasantness, unpleasantness, and familiarity of the odor, as well as self-reported emotional responses (valence, arousal, dominance) to the odor were assessed in 13 homosexual and 14 heterosexual men. Isovaleric acid served as a control substance. Homosexual men displayed significantly higher olfactory sensitivity to the odor of androstenone than heterosexual men (p∈ ∈0.25) . Moreover, both groups did not differ in their judgments of or in their emotional response to androstenone or isovaleric acid. The current results indicate that men's sexual orientation significantly impacts the perception of androstenone but that this effect does not necessarily extend to subjective judgments. © 2009 Springer Science + Business Media, LLC.