Olfactory Cognition

Olfactory Cognition PDF

Author: Gesualdo Zucco

Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing

Published: 2012

Total Pages: 338

ISBN-13: 9027213518

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This book was conceived as a tribute to one of the founders of the psychological study of the sense of smell, Professor Trygg Engen. The book is divided into four sections. The first reunites the fields of psychophysics and the perception of environmental odours and discusses the impact of odours on beliefs and expectations. The second addresses cognitive processes in olfaction, how odours are interpreted, lexicalized, associated with contexts and remembered. The third focuses on the cerebral bases of olfactory awareness and the neuropsychological investigation of olfaction with special emphasis on olfactory dysfunctions, and the last concerns affective and developmental processes in olfaction. The aim in producing this book is that it will help promote further research in olfactory cognition and attract new inquisitive scientists to the field. The volume will be a useful resource for academics, students, and professionals who study olfaction, as well as to scientists who work in the domains of perception, cognitive neuroscience and environmental psychology more broadly.

Olfaction, Taste, and Cognition

Olfaction, Taste, and Cognition PDF

Author: Catherine Rouby

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2002-10-28

Total Pages: 488

ISBN-13: 1139437526

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The human body has developed complex sensory processing systems which manifest themselves in our emotions, memory, and language. This book examines such olfactory and gustatory cognition. Leading experts have written chapters on many facets of taste and smell, including odor memory, genetic variation in taste, and the hedonistic dimensions of odors.

Olfactory Cognition

Olfactory Cognition PDF

Author: Gesualdo M. Zucco

Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing

Published: 2012-03-28

Total Pages: 339

ISBN-13: 9027274649

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This book was conceived as a tribute to one of the founders of the psychological study of the sense of smell, Professor Trygg Engen. The book is divided into four sections. The first reunites the fields of psychophysics and the perception of environmental odours and discusses the impact of odours on beliefs and expectations. The second addresses cognitive processes in olfaction, how odours are interpreted, lexicalized, associated with contexts and remembered. The third focuses on the cerebral bases of olfactory awareness and the neuropsychological investigation of olfaction with special emphasis on olfactory dysfunctions, and the last concerns affective and developmental processes in olfaction. The aim in producing this book is that it will help promote further research in olfactory cognition and attract new inquisitive scientists to the field. The volume will be a useful resource for academics, students, and professionals who study olfaction, as well as to scientists who work in the domains of perception, cognitive neuroscience and environmental psychology more broadly.

Olfaction

Olfaction PDF

Author: Joel L. Davis

Publisher: MIT Press

Published: 1991

Total Pages: 348

ISBN-13: 9780262041249

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Computational neuroscientists have recently turned to modeling olfactory structures because these are likely to have the same functional properties as currently popular network designs for perception and memory. This book provides a useful survey of current work on olfactory system circuitry, including connections of this system to brain structures involved in cognition and memory, and describes the computational models of olfactory processing that have been developed to date. Contributions cover empirical investigations of the neurobiology of the olfactory systems (anatomy, physiology, synaptic plasticity, behavioral physiology) as well as the application of computer models to understanding these systems. Fundamental issues in olfactory processing by the nervous systems such as experimental strategies in the study of olfaction, stages of odor processing, and critical questions in sensory coding are considered across empirical/applied boundaries and throughout the contributions. ContributorsI. Fundamental Anatomy, Physiology, and Plasticity of the Olfactory System, Gordon M. Shepherd. John S. Kauer, S. R. Neff, Kathryn A. Hamilton, and Angel R. Cinelli. Kevin L. Ketchum, Lewis B. Haberly. Joseph L. Price, S. Thomas Carmichael, Ken M. Carnes, Marie Christine Clugnet, Masaru Kuroda, and James P. Ray. Michael Leon, Donald A. Wilson, and Kathleen M. Guthrie. Gary Lynch and Richard Granger. Howard Eichenbaum, Tim Otto, Cynthia Wible, and Jean Piper. - II. Developments in Computational Models of the Olfactory System, DeLiang Wang, Joachim Buhmann, and Christoph von der Marlsburg. Walter Freeman. Richard Granger, Ursula Staubi, José Ambrose-Ingersoll, and Gary Lynch. James M. Bower. Dan Hammerstrom and Eric Means.

The Neurobiology of Olfaction

The Neurobiology of Olfaction PDF

Author: Anna Menini

Publisher: CRC Press

Published: 2009-11-24

Total Pages: 438

ISBN-13: 1420071998

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Comprehensive Overview of Advances in OlfactionThe common belief is that human smell perception is much reduced compared with other mammals, so that whatever abilities are uncovered and investigated in animal research would have little significance for humans. However, new evidence from a variety of sources indicates this traditional view is likely

Learning to Smell

Learning to Smell PDF

Author: Donald A. Wilson

Publisher: JHU Press

Published: 2006-06-06

Total Pages: 340

ISBN-13: 0801888948

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Written by a neurobiologist and a psychologist, this volume presents a new theory of olfactory perception. Drawing on research in neuroscience, physiology, and ethology, Donald A. Wilson and Richard J. Stevenson address the fundamental question of how we navigate through a world of chemical encounters and provide a compelling alternative to the "reception-centric" view of olfaction. The major research challenge in olfaction is determining how the brain discriminates one smell from another. Here, the authors hold that olfaction is generally not a simple physiochemical process, but rather a plastic process that is strongly tied to memory. They find the traditional approach—which involves identifying how particular features of a chemical stimulus are represented in the olfactory system—to be at odds with historical data and with a growing body of neurobiological and psychological evidence that places primary emphasis on synthetic processing and experiential factors. Wilson and Stevenson propose that experience and cortical plasticity not only are important for traditional associative olfactory memory but also play a critical, defining role in odor perception and that current views are insufficient to account for current and past data. The book includes a broad comparative overview of the structure and function of olfactory systems, an exploration into the mechanisms of odor detection and olfactory perception, and a discussion of the implications of the authors' theory. Learning to Smell will serve as an important reference for workers within the field of chemical senses and those interested in sensory processing and perception.

Applied Olfactory Cognition

Applied Olfactory Cognition PDF

Author: Gesualdo M Zucco

Publisher: Frontiers E-books

Published: 2014-12-02

Total Pages: 240

ISBN-13: 2889193438

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Foreword by Richard J. Stevenson, Macquarie University (Australia). It was long thought that the human nose might be able to discriminate somewhere in the order of 10,000 different odourants. The recent finding that the human nose can discriminate something like a trillion different smells serves as yet another reminder that we have again underestimated the capacity of our sense of smell (Bushdid, Magnasco, Vosshall & Keller, 2014). This volume serves as a further corrective for anyone who should hold the view that olfaction is unimportant in human affairs. The papers presented in this ebook, carefully collated and overseen by Aldo Zucco, Benoist Schaal, Mats Olsson and Ilona Croy, showcase a large number of quite different reasons for studying the applied side of olfaction, and indeed human olfaction in general. The 23 contributions presented here cover a broad range of topics, which illustrate contemporary interests in our field. Although with a strong applied focus, a noteworthy feature of this ebook is the richness of the theoretical perspectives that are developed. These range from considerations of olfactory perception, memory, expertise, and priming right the way through to receptor genetics. These contributions, from many leading experts in the field, will surely shape much of the applied work linking olfaction to disease, which is a further focus of this ebook. In respect to health and disease, the chapters on aging, pregnancy, depression, alcohol dependency and environmental odours, present overviews and rich new data on many contemporary problems, to which the study of olfaction is now contributing. A particularly notable aspect of olfactory experience is the affective impact that odours can have on people and their lives. The ebook covers some particularly intriguing aspects of work in this area, with empirical studies investigating dissociations between wanting and liking, stress reduction in the elderly, mother-infant bonding, and the emotions that different odourants can evoke. This affective line of work is nicely complemented by empirical studies on expertise, the effect of odours on visual attention, and the relationship between particular personality traits and interest in olfaction. The gradual appropriation of methods from cognitive neuroscience into olfaction is also nicely represented in this ebook, with at least three of the chapters reporting data using neuroimaging, including a particular intriguing study looking at recognition of odours in mixtures. Finally, the close links between olfactory perception and sensory evaluation are also reflected in a chapter on wine. I hope that readers of this e-book will be struck, as I have been in reading its various chapters, how much olfaction affects our lives, and how the study of this sense can enrich it. References Bushdid, C., Magnasco, M., Vosshall, L. & Keller, A. (2014). Humans can discriminate more than 1 trillion olfactory stimuli. Science, 343, 1370-1372.

The Neuropsychology of Smell and Taste

The Neuropsychology of Smell and Taste PDF

Author: G. Neil Martin

Publisher: Psychology Press

Published: 2013-06-19

Total Pages: 287

ISBN-13: 1135090173

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Smell and taste are our most misunderstood senses. Given a choice between losing our sense of smell and taste, or our senses of sight and hearing, most people nominate the former, rather than the latter. Yet our sense of smell and taste has the power to stir up memories, alter our mood and even influence our behaviour. In The Neuropsychology of Smell and Taste, Neil Martin provides a comprehensive, critical analysis of the role of the brain in gustation and olfaction. In his accessible and characteristic style he shows why our sense of smell and taste do not simply perform basic and intermittent functions, but lie at the very centre of our perception of the world around us. Through an exploration of the physiology, anatomy and neuropsychology of the senses; the neurophysiological causes of smell and taste disorders, and their function in physical and mental illness, Neil Martin provides an accessible and up-to-date overview of the processes of gustation and olfaction. The Neuropsychology of Smell and Taste provides a state-of-the-art overview of current research in olfactory and gustatory perception. With sections describing the effect of odour and taste on our behaviour, and evaluating the contribution current neuroimaging technology has made to our understanding of the senses, the book will be of interest to researchers and students of neuropsychology and neuroscience, and anybody with an interest in olfaction and gustation.

Smellosophy

Smellosophy PDF

Author: A. S. Barwich

Publisher: Harvard University Press

Published: 2020-07-14

Total Pages: 385

ISBN-13: 0674983696

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A pioneering exploration of olfaction that upsets settled notions of how the brain translates sensory information. Decades of cognition research have shown that external stimuli “spark” neural patterns in particular regions of the brain. This has fostered a view of the brain as a space that we can map: here the brain responds to faces, there it perceives a sensation in your left hand. But it turns out that the sense of smell—only recently attracting broader attention in neuroscience—doesn’t work this way. A. S. Barwich asks a deceptively simple question: What does the nose tell the brain, and how does the brain understand it? Barwich interviews experts in neuroscience, psychology, chemistry, and perfumery in an effort to understand the biological mechanics and myriad meanings of odors. She argues that it is time to stop recycling ideas based on the paradigm of vision for the olfactory system. Scents are often fickle and boundless in comparison with visual images, and they do not line up with well-defined neural regions. Although olfaction remains a puzzle, Barwich proposes that what we know suggests the brain acts not only like a map but also as a measuring device, one that senses and processes simple and complex odors. Accounting for the sense of smell upsets theories of perception philosophers have developed. In their place, Smellosophy articulates a new model for understanding how the brain represents sensory information.

Olfactory memory networks: from emotional learning to social behaviors

Olfactory memory networks: from emotional learning to social behaviors PDF

Author: Regina M. Sullivan

Publisher: Frontiers Media SA

Published: 2015-05-08

Total Pages: 289

ISBN-13: 2889194868

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Odors are powerful stimuli that can evoke emotional states, and support learning and memory. Decades of research have indicated that the neural basis for this strong “odor-emotional memory” connection is due to the uniqueness of the anatomy of the olfactory pathways. Indeed, unlike the other sensory systems, the sense of smell does not pass through the thalamus to be routed to the cortex. Rather, odor information is relayed directly to the limbic system, a brain region typically associated with memory and emotional processes. This provides olfaction with a unique and potent power to influence mood, acquisition of new information, and use of information in many different contexts including social interactions. Indeed, olfaction is crucially involved in behaviors essential for survival of the individual and species, including identification of predators, recognition of individuals for procreation or social hierarchy, location of food, as well as attachment between mating pairs and infant-caretaker dyads. Importantly, odors are sampled through sniffing behavior. This active sensing plays an important role in exploratory behaviors observed in the different contexts mentioned above. Odors are also critical for learning and memory about events and places and constitute efficient retrieval cues for the recall of emotional episodic memories. This broad role for odors appears highly preserved across species. In addition, the consistent early developmental emergence of olfactory function across diverse species also provides a unique window of opportunity for analysis of myriad behavioral systems from rodents to nonhuman primates and humans. This, when combined with the relatively conserved organization of the olfactory system in mammals, provides a powerful framework to explore how complex behaviors can be modulated by odors to produce adaptive responses, and to investigate the underlying neural networks. The present research topic brings together cutting edge research on diverse species and developmental stages, highlighting convergence and divergence between humans and animals to facilitate translational research.