People with similar body odour more likely to make friends with each other, study shows

Researchers in Israel have stated that people who have similar body odours are more likely to make friends with each other.

The scientists say they made the decision by smelling clothes with a device called an ‘eNose’ which suggest that the sense of smell may play a larger role in human social interactions than previously thought.

Researchers found out that two dogs carefully sniff each other before deciding whether to play or bark viciously.

They say the sense of smell plays a major role in social interactions and wanted to find out why humans don’t sniff each other before associating with each other like all other mammals do.

The new study was conducted by experts at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, Israel and published in the journal Science Advances.

‘Because humans seek friends who are similar to themselves, we hypothesised that humans may smell themselves and others to subconsciously estimate body odour similarity, which, in turn, may promote friendship,’ the authors say.

‘Perfect strangers may begin to interest us at first sniffs rather than at first sight alone.’

It’s already known that people tend to become friends with others who are similar to themselves in appearance, background, values and even in measures such as brain activity, past studies suggest.