As near as I can tell, “feminine” scents tend to be sweet, flowery, or fruity. Generally, the scents one would associate with a garden. Masculine scents tend to be salt, pine, or other scents you would associate with untamed wilderness.
I get the sense that you look at some preexisting division of scents into masculine/feminine, and then you make generalizations about each category using your nose. Where does that preexisting division come from? I would guess e.g. personal hygiene product marketing. I wonder how that correlates with other product categories, other cultures/times/places, and non-artificial body smells. I also wonder what operational definition the creators and copywriters of these products have in mind.
Almost certainly, the division comes from marketing. Since gardeny things are perceived as feminine and outdoorsy things are percieved as masculine, that’s how they’re marketed.
How I know this is looking at the most popular scents for each gender. I think the associations are probably arbitrary and just the product of positive reinforcement in social trends (the more men use a scent, the more masculine it is perceived as being and the more men use it). The easy answer is that the creators and copywriters have in mind whatever they can market as masculine to men and feminine to women.
When I smell something, I almost always experience positive or negative affect depending on the smell. I rarely recognize smells, though, except for very common ones. I don’t expect to correctly recognize “garden” vs “forest”.
I wonder if many people reliably react to scents marketed as feminine or masculine by actually identifying them. If someone used a scent marketed to the opposite sex, how many people (being in a position to smell it clearly) would notice a discrepancy? How many would dislike “inappropriate” scents more than regularly gendered ones? Have there been studies (which plausibly weren’t written or published in part as PR copy?)
Even if all the answers are “no”, I think the scents industry would be able to sell products as they do now, on the force of suggestion; so both “yes” and “no” answers wouldn’t contradict the fact that such sales are are successful. But I wonder how much truth there is to this marketing, other than social conditioning (if even that).
Also, if it helps, I have never heard a girl complaining that a guy’s house smelled “too feminine.” The reason I mentioned that there are “masculine” scents, is that I HAVE heard guys say that they don’t want to get candles or other smell-good options for their home because they don’t want their place to smell “girly”.
I agree that I doubt there is anything inherently “feminine” or “masculine” about the scents that are noted as such.
But if you DO care about masculine scents, two helpful hints-- 1) If you can’t tell masculine scents, but can tell masculine colors, just go by look. Masculine scents are more frequently colored more masculine hues of black, blue, brown and green. (but not the uber-bright versions of those colors). (But be warned that brown is often “food” flavors as well, like cookies) Gender-neutral clean scents are generally colored white or yellow and will have words like “linen”, “fresh”, and “lemon”. Going by color gives you another bonus, in that you can get it to match your decor.
2) If you DO go into a Bath and Body Works, or other such store, just ask the people who work there for what you need. They’re happy to help. That’s what they get paid for.
Masculine scents are more frequently colored more masculine hues
Scents have color, now? I am afraid I’m not synaesthetic enough to grok that :-)
While I asked whether scents marketed as gender-specific really had something to do with gender, I already know there’s no such thing as an inherently gendered color. (Also: my favorite shirt colors are yellow and pink. Nobody’s ever said they were inappropriately “feminine”.)
I have never heard a girl complaining that a guy’s house smelled “too feminine.”
Gendering a whole room is weird. How should a bedroom shared by a man & woman couple smell? Or a working room, or a saloon?
More pertinently, do you think anyone would complain about actual people smelling gender-inappropriately?
do you think anyone would complain about actual people smelling gender-inappropriately?
I’ve never heard anyone complain about someone else’s scent being gender-nonconforming, but I have noticed a few men being careful that their own scented products conform. Not that often, though. Actually it’s more common in my experience for people to worry that someone else (like, someone they’re buying a gift for) won’t want to wear other-gender-associated scents. For example, my mother-in-law gave us some floral-scented fabric softener while implying that my husband might not like it used on his clothes (in fact he likes it).
As near as I can tell, “feminine” scents tend to be sweet, flowery, or fruity. Generally, the scents one would associate with a garden. Masculine scents tend to be salt, pine, or other scents you would associate with untamed wilderness.
How do you know this?
I get the sense that you look at some preexisting division of scents into masculine/feminine, and then you make generalizations about each category using your nose. Where does that preexisting division come from? I would guess e.g. personal hygiene product marketing. I wonder how that correlates with other product categories, other cultures/times/places, and non-artificial body smells. I also wonder what operational definition the creators and copywriters of these products have in mind.
Almost certainly, the division comes from marketing. Since gardeny things are perceived as feminine and outdoorsy things are percieved as masculine, that’s how they’re marketed.
How I know this is looking at the most popular scents for each gender. I think the associations are probably arbitrary and just the product of positive reinforcement in social trends (the more men use a scent, the more masculine it is perceived as being and the more men use it). The easy answer is that the creators and copywriters have in mind whatever they can market as masculine to men and feminine to women.
When I smell something, I almost always experience positive or negative affect depending on the smell. I rarely recognize smells, though, except for very common ones. I don’t expect to correctly recognize “garden” vs “forest”.
I wonder if many people reliably react to scents marketed as feminine or masculine by actually identifying them. If someone used a scent marketed to the opposite sex, how many people (being in a position to smell it clearly) would notice a discrepancy? How many would dislike “inappropriate” scents more than regularly gendered ones? Have there been studies (which plausibly weren’t written or published in part as PR copy?)
Even if all the answers are “no”, I think the scents industry would be able to sell products as they do now, on the force of suggestion; so both “yes” and “no” answers wouldn’t contradict the fact that such sales are are successful. But I wonder how much truth there is to this marketing, other than social conditioning (if even that).
Also, if it helps, I have never heard a girl complaining that a guy’s house smelled “too feminine.” The reason I mentioned that there are “masculine” scents, is that I HAVE heard guys say that they don’t want to get candles or other smell-good options for their home because they don’t want their place to smell “girly”.
I agree that I doubt there is anything inherently “feminine” or “masculine” about the scents that are noted as such.
But if you DO care about masculine scents, two helpful hints--
1) If you can’t tell masculine scents, but can tell masculine colors, just go by look. Masculine scents are more frequently colored more masculine hues of black, blue, brown and green. (but not the uber-bright versions of those colors). (But be warned that brown is often “food” flavors as well, like cookies) Gender-neutral clean scents are generally colored white or yellow and will have words like “linen”, “fresh”, and “lemon”. Going by color gives you another bonus, in that you can get it to match your decor.
2) If you DO go into a Bath and Body Works, or other such store, just ask the people who work there for what you need. They’re happy to help. That’s what they get paid for.
Scents have color, now? I am afraid I’m not synaesthetic enough to grok that :-)
While I asked whether scents marketed as gender-specific really had something to do with gender, I already know there’s no such thing as an inherently gendered color. (Also: my favorite shirt colors are yellow and pink. Nobody’s ever said they were inappropriately “feminine”.)
Gendering a whole room is weird. How should a bedroom shared by a man & woman couple smell? Or a working room, or a saloon?
More pertinently, do you think anyone would complain about actual people smelling gender-inappropriately?
I’ve never heard anyone complain about someone else’s scent being gender-nonconforming, but I have noticed a few men being careful that their own scented products conform. Not that often, though. Actually it’s more common in my experience for people to worry that someone else (like, someone they’re buying a gift for) won’t want to wear other-gender-associated scents. For example, my mother-in-law gave us some floral-scented fabric softener while implying that my husband might not like it used on his clothes (in fact he likes it).
When I’m choosing a scent or scented object, my only worry is that my cat may not like it.