Women More Sensitive To Body Odor

By Dr. Brian McDonough, Medical Editor

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) - It may be a generalization but I think it is fair to say that men seem to be more accepting of body odor in others than women. But, being one to not just accept a theory on simple observation, I went back to a report from the Monell Center which specializes in this.

A few years ago a study looked at the ability of fragrances to block body odor and it finds that only 2 of 32 scents effectively blocked underarm odor when women were doing the smelling. In contrast, 19 scents effectively reduced the strength of underarm odor for men.

In addition, male underarm odors appear to be tougher to block with fragrances than female underarm odors.

So, what we found is that women are more sensitive to body odor and men are less sensitive but that might be because they are used to smelling worse.