Romantic Partner’s Body Odor and Relationship Quality

As a powerful medium for nonverbal social communication, body odors convey important cues about our romantic partner’s emotions. Since understanding each other’s emotions is crucial for romantic relationships, body odors may foster attachment and connection in these contexts. Using a survey study with 206 participants, we explored how the odor of a romantic partner influenced relationship quality. Specifically, we investigated whether individuals’ beliefs about their partner’s body odor were associated with explicit relationship quality indicators (relationship satisfaction, emotional and sexual intimacy) controlling for partner’s other traits. Our results showed the importance of thinking of a romantic partner’s odor as pleasant for sexual intimacy above and beyond other traits. We also provide preliminary evidence that the mere evaluation of a partner’s body odor was associated with feelings of safety and sexual arousal, which in turn predicted greater emotional and sexual intimacy, respectively. The present study advances our understanding of how body odors contribute to romantic chemistry and opens the way for more nuanced investigations.