Odorization of a novel object can influence infant's exploratory behavior in unexpected ways.

2008

International audience; Although much is known about the development of object exploration during infancy, it remains to be understood whether and how olfaction can influence infants' interactions with novel objects. To address these issues, sixteen infants aged 7-15 months were videotaped during two consecutive 5-min free play sessions with a scented or an unscented version of visually similar objects. Results indicate that adding an odor to a novel object influenced the infants' behavior: the infants exhibited more and longer manipulations and mouthing of the unscented object than of the scented object. The differential responsiveness to the scented, relative to the unscented, object was …