Boston-based content creator Caroline Stern has a secret weapon for getting work done: Maison Mataha’s Escapade Gourmande, which she calls “the most beautifully executed vanilla.” When she spritzs it on, she says, “I feel like I’m that girl, and that girl is actively participating and productive in her life, because I embody the vibe of that scent.”
When you’re “focusing” at work or in a big meeting, you might listen to certain songs or wear certain clothes to make you feel powerful and focused, but don’t ignore the power of scent.
There’s scientific evidence that certain scents help us work and think better. Scent experts explain why and share tips for finding the scent that’s best for you.
Scents activate the brain.
What you smell can affect your mood and your ability to get work done in complex ways.
One reason is that we simply like smelling good: “Pleasant smells are associated with better performance, presumably through improved mood, whereas unpleasant smells decrease performance, presumably because of negative mood,” said Mark Moss, head of psychology at Northumbria University, who studies the effects of scent on mood and cognition.
“It is believed that a pleasant scent can improve mood and therefore performance.”
– Mark Moss, Head of Psychology, Northumbria University
Another important reason why scents help us work better is because of how they interact with the brain: The olfactory bulb, located behind the nose and responsible for processing what we smell, “projects to more areas of the brain than any other sensory organ,” says Moss.
“Scents are made up of tiny volatile compounds that, when we inhale, are transported to the lungs, where they enter the bloodstream and are delivered directly to the brain,” Moss continues. “Because these molecules are so small, they can cross the blood-brain barrier and act directly on the brain’s neurochemical systems.”
This means that when you inhale an odor, it is immediately transmitted to your brain.
The scent of herbs in particular can help you concentrate.
If you’re looking to boost your productivity, especially if you need focus, Moss recommends peppermint, while rosemary and sage contain compounds that have been shown in studies to have memory-boosting effects.
“Perhaps not surprisingly, calming scents such as lavender and chamomile are not recommended,” he says.
Loreto Remsing, a perfumer in Novato, California, said she gravitates toward “invigorating, fresh, outdoor scents” when she wants to be more productive at work. She cited peppermint, eucalyptus, citrus, conifers and herbal scents like coriander and rosemary as examples.
The scent she often recommends for people looking to improve focus is basil.
“When I was in college in the late ’90s, I would make little aromatherapy sprays with a few drops of basil essential oil in distilled water and bring them to school,” she recalls. “When I needed a pick-me-up, I’d spray it on my face or all over my body. It was really helpful in rejuvenating my senses between noon and 4 p.m., when my energy starts to wane.”
If you want to try it for yourself, Remsing suggests an energizing spray made with basil, bergamot, and pink grapefruit essential oils diluted with distilled water. “Add 10 to 20 drops of essential oil to 4 ounces of distilled water. Spray on your face and surrounding area for an energizing effect,” Remsing says.
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Exposure to new scents can also help evoke memories.
When searching for the ideal scent to boost your productivity, you don’t have to stick to just one scent: A study published in Frontiers in Neuroscience found that exposure to a variety of scents could improve memory and learning in older adults.
In the study, 43 healthy older adults used a diffuser at night. One group alternated between smelling the pleasant scents of rose, orange, eucalyptus, lemon, peppermint, rosemary, and lavender, while the other group only smelled distilled water. After six months, participants who smelled the pleasant scents every night showed a 226% improvement in learning and memory tests compared to the group who did not smell the scents.
Michael Leon, a neurobiologist at the University of California, Irvine and one of the study’s authors, said that if you want to improve your memory or focus, exposing yourself to different smells on a regular basis could help.
“While people may prefer certain smells at work or at home, they need to be exposed to multiple smells over time to gain a cognitive advantage,” Leon told HuffPost.
If you want to apply this discovery to your daily life, pay attention to what interesting, new scents you come across each day. That’s what Tracy Wang does. Wang, a Toronto-based author and scent consultant, says she doesn’t have a go-to scent for boosting her productivity, but says, “The simple act of smelling something new helps sharpen my attention. I try out multiple scents a week, so it works well.”
Also, remember that the perfect productivity scent for you may be different from someone else’s.
The experts I asked gave a wide range of answers about what scents they prefer to help them focus.
Wang said rosemary and sage are associated with freshness and the outdoors, which can help refresh the mood and improve focus, but acknowledged that “it could be idiosyncratic and psychosomatic.”
The answers may also be tied to personal memories: Stern traces her scent preferences back to her middle school locker rooms, where the popular girls smelled like cupcakes, strawberries, and passion fruit.
Stern said the scent combination “exuded a wave of confidence and cohesion that I was struggling with at the time,” recalling, “And weirdly enough, it’s stayed with me, and I associate those scent notes and that scent family with being ‘that girl.'”
“Early experiences with a smell actually change how the brain responds to that smell later in life, which is why different people respond very differently to the same smell,” Leon explains. “The military once tried to develop scents that could disperse crowds without causing harm, but they were unable to find a universally negative response to any smell.”
In other words, what is pleasant and invigorating to you may be downright unpleasant to someone else.
After all, we all have different tastes and preferences, and discovering the perfect scent for productivity is a journey only you can take. Stern suggests using Fragrantica, the “Reddit for perfumes and fragrances,” to identify the scents you’re drawn to and find out which perfumes have them.
Just remember that if you want the scent to work for you, it will work for you too. If you start to get into the habit of always using a particular candle or scent when completing a particular task, that ritual will help you get in the zone.
“I don’t think we should underestimate our ability to trick ourselves with associations with certain scents,” Wang says. “I used to listen to the same song over and over again when I needed to write, and now I associate that song with being productive. The same can be said for scents.”
In this way, smelling is believing, or as Moss puts it: “If we believe and expect that a scent will have a particular effect, we’re motivated to not violate that expectation, and therefore more likely to actually have that effect.”
