Human responses to flower fragrance of Lilium ‘Siberia’ and Rosa ‘Escimo’

The objective of our study was to lay a foundation for the effect of flower fragrance on human emotions and to provide a theory for the choice of indoor plants and the improvement of the olfactory environment. Specifically, our purpose was to study human physiological responses to flower fragrance of Lilium ‘Siberia’ and Rosa ‘Escimo’. The participants were 31 college students. Blood pressure, pulse rate, finger temperature (FT) and galvanic skin response (GSR) were measured. The results show that the fragrance of Rosa ‘Escimo’ causes the diastolic pressure and pulse rate of the participants to reduce significantly. The average decrease was 0.37 kPa and 2.23 beats per minute, which indicates that sympathetic nervous activity increases, physiological arousal decreases and emotional alleviation occurs. Furthermore, the GSR of participants significantly increased by smelling the fragrance of Lilium ‘Siberia’, indicating that both sympathetic nervous activity and physiological arousal increased. But the data could not prove that flower fragrance stimulation has an effect on changes in systolic pressure and finger temperature. Some other factors, such as basic emotion and weather, may have an effect.