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Clean Smells Promote Ethical Behavior
A recent study is suggesting that moral behavior may be encouraged with nothing more than clean smells. The Brigham Young University professor found a "dramatic improvement in ethical behavior with just a few spritzes of citrus-scented Windex." "The researchers see implications for workplaces, retail stores and other organizations that have relied on traditional surveillance and security measures to enforce rules. Perhaps the findings could be applied at home, too, Liljenquist said with a smile. 'Could be that getting our kids to clean up their rooms might help them clean up their acts, too.' The study titled "The Smell of Virtue" was unusually simple and conclusive. Participants engaged in several tasks, the only difference being that some worked in unscented rooms, while others worked in rooms freshly spritzed with Windex."
You know she only cleans this thoroughly when she's angry, so we'd damn well better behave until this blows over.
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I call bs...whenever an attractive woman walks by smelling like she just stepped out of the shower I have only immoral thoughts.
But what if the task I'm assigned to do is to rob a bank? Does the spritz of Windex make my action ethical?
I never trusted the poop smith.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
I don't know about any of you, but being in a smelly, disgusting store makes me unhappy.
"I'm Dirty D, damnit! I just need to be diiiirty!"
"Love heals scars love left." -- Henry Rollins
I love the smell of Windex in the morning... The smell, you know that fresh smell... Smells like, virtue.
One convenient locations...in Africa.
What's with the modeling/glamour shots photo of the professor on the article?
my karma will be here long after I'm gone
It's crappy experiments like this that give pseudo-science a bad name.
There are so many confounding and uncontrolled variables that the results are meaningless.
Did they repeat the experiment with the clean and dirty rooms swapped?
Were the subjects and experiment runners randomized? How many subjects?
Were the subjects sequestered or could they have smelled the Windex while waiting to participate?
Were there any other differences between the test rooms?
It's crappy experiments like this that give pseudo-science a bad name.
If a place smells like a moose just died in it, especially if its also visibly dirty, then I just sort of get the impression that it doesn't actually matter what I do in there. On the other hand, when a place is spotless, smells lemony fresh and everything appears in order then I'm not going to be the one to put my feet on the coffee table, no matter how tempting it might be. Smell ties into taste and is one of the more powerful senses we have, so it makes sense that it would play a large part in determining our impression of what is or isn't acceptable in a given location, every bit as much as it tells us what foods seem OK to eat.
Which is it that did it? This appears to measure the effect of Windex, not scents. Great publicity for Windex though. I'm appalled at what passes for science these days. The public knows no better.
...I wonder what the Capitol Building must smell like?
There's no link to the original study, but it was clear from the article that there was no control group. They had a scented room vs. an unscented room, when what they should have had was a "pleasantly" scented room vs. an "unpleasantly" scented room with a third, unscented room as the control. Then they should have done some feedback questionnaires at the conclusion, in which they could have buried a question or two regarding the participant's scent preferences to see how well the participants' evaluation of the smell of the rooms lined-up with the premise of the study.
This study was actually just a subset of the premise that happy people are more likely to be grateful and donate their time and/or money than unhappy people, and that environmental factors can influence a person's relative happiness. And a demonstration that an attractive woman can get money and resources from a major university to run a useless study.
The study titled "The Smell of Virtue" was unusually simple and conclusive. Participants engaged in several tasks, the only difference being that some worked in unscented rooms, while others worked in rooms freshly spritzed with Windex
Katie Liljenquist, assistant professor of organizational leadership at BYU's Marriott School of Management, is the lead author on the piece in a forthcoming issue of Psychological Science.
0 = 1 + e^(Alt something)
Cleanliness really IS next to godliness.
You just need to spritz her with some Windex and all immoral thoughts will disappear.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
The study was done with unscented rooms and rooms with a few spritzes of citrus windex.
Am I the only one who would think that unscented = clean? Because according to the study, citrus windex = clean, and unscented = not clean.
This should be sterile (unscented) vs. perfumed (citrus windex).
When I smell a co-worker doused in perfume, I usually think she's covering up for NOT being clean. I do prefer the fresh scent of lilac and lavender (GAIN Laundry!) It makes me ever so polite and generous.
So I would assume that hospitals smell good. The medical industry all smells good. So why is there so much corruption in that industry?
This explains why the average Slashdotter has such disregard for copyright!
Don't take life so seriously. No one makes it out alive.
Let's get this straight. Windex typically reeks of ammonia. And so do public elevators where winos have urinated.
A coincidence? A paradox? Or, are the guys at Brigham Young sniffing gold spraypaint trying to come up with new ideas? Hmmmmm...?
http://news.byu.edu/archive09-Oct-smellofvirtue.aspx - original article with a video
The same Brigham Young University that has an article about how one of their archaeologists has proven the Book of Mormon's ludicrous ficitonal pre-Colombian American History is valid? http://newsnet.byu.edu/story.cfm/50535
http://twitter.com/OLDTELEGRAM
This is a really good post!
I take it you are all out of Windex?
Windex, not only cleans your house, but now cleans up your life!
Correlation/Causation and all that. The point is... unethical behavior is what leads to the bad smells.
... that makes the auto salesmen pull all kinds of dirty tricks.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
Who funded this study again?
This ethical study brought to you by S. C. Johnson & Son Inc.
Not sure how it could encourage good behavior.
Blah.
So is this post!
What about at strip clubs, where they clean frequently with Isopropyl Alcohol... Those places are ethical right?
Sounds like wall street could use a few hundred cases of Windex. Straighten out them bankers once and fer all... On second thought, Washington DC, all state capitals and local governments need a few cases as well. This is what happens when Aunt Bea isn't around to clean the courthouse / jail daily.
--I like turtles...
A Brigham Young University professor suggesting a possible biochemical link to ethical behavior. Sounds like a letter of resignation to me.
Wait till they try out Linex. Trounces Windex hands down it will!
I don't know about any of you, but being in a smelly, disgusting store makes me unhappy.
I agree and I base my entire mood on the smells of the locations I have been to during my day.
For instance, if I go into a gas station bathroom during my day I am liable to become completely enraged or possibly even suicidal at the thought of the acts previously taken in order to create such smells.
Depending upon how bad the smells were, I may even kidnap a child or go on a shooting rampage because of them.
On the other hand if I journey to a flower shop and take in the 'wonderful' scents of flowers and the unneeded perfumes I am likely to smell emanating from the woman behind the counter I will go even crazier due to my allergies and form some sort of murderous coalition or cult.
As you can clearly see, this proves smells have a great effect on emotions and the actions taken because of them.
There is a famous study (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawthorne_effect) in which they were looking at the effect of lighting levels on productivity in a manufacturing environment. If they turned up the light productivity improved, if they lowered lighting level productivity improved, if they returned lighting to the original level productivity improved. The reason was that changing light levels signaled to the workers that something was up and that they were likely being watched. Walk into a room dripping with cleaner and your knows will tell you that something is up and you better watch out.
I dont see this as valid, unless they had each group tested in both a scented and unscented room. It could be just as likely that they had people more willing to give in the scented room than in the other, with the scent having no real effect.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
People do. Smells aren't the ones that do that, but associations of it in people's mind. What seem to work in some regions or cultures could have different effects in others. If associations are the ones that do the job, then trends of decoration (not just smell, but visual, lights, architecture, etc) for public places should follow that ideas. Of course, i don't think that the only alternative that will be good for banks is to look and smell like torture chambers, but probably most elements that promote some behaviour were tested in the past in a way or another.
... that explains plumbers, then.
I propose a grant for a study to determine what scents make Professor Liljenquist more likely to put out...
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
Of course smell matters. Ask any car seller why they have sprays of new cars scents. Hey, a car that smells like new will sell for a higher price.
Ummm... is it just me, or was bad smells causing bad behavior NOT PRESENT AT ALL in the study... Why do so many comments keep equating the two? We can debate whether citrus scented windex constitutes a clean smell or not, whether the other methods were robust, etc... But the study was about clean smells and ethical behavior and had nothing to do with bad smells and unethical behavior. Even assuming that "clean smells" promoted more ethical behavior, it does not logically follow that "unclean" smells would promote unethical behavior. This isn't physics where "equal and opposite reaction" rules apply. It is phsiology and phychology... Where giving a stimulant to a chronically hyperactive child calms them down. Where people always say one thing when they really mean a mother... Who said clean smells good? Stick your nose over a bottle of ammonia and tell me that again! Yet ammonia is still popular as a cleaning agent, and many would call it a clean smell.
Contents of Windex:
* Isopropanol
* 2-Butoxyethanol
* Ethylene glycol n-hexyl ether
* Water
* Ammonia
But apparently, no, it's the "clean smell" that does it. (Ignoring the possibility we are only socialised to associate things like Isopropanol and Ammonia with "clean")
*Frrppbptbtbptbpt!*
Flame on!
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
Does everything have to be frickin scented? Crap, it seems like every frickin product around has got to have a scent. And there are waaayyyyyy too many people who have no familiarity with the idea of "less is more"... now we have to have scents to promote ethical behavior? Just get people to take showers and lay off all the perfumed crap. Sheeeesh.
The tyrant will always find a pretext for his tyranny - Aesop
Windex comes in citrus?
Don't be apathetic. Procrastinate!
Chemical smells make me feel instantly ill .. cleaners, cigarette smoke, air 'fresheners' .. all instantly feel sick / headache
Divide a cake by zero. Is it still a cake?
More proof we need to clean up how our corporate masters live.
Surround yourself with expensive, old alcohol, expensive stinky cigars, old dead animal furniture... and the smell of used hookers... that's the IDEAL of "good" business men? No wonder we're so fucked up.
I wonder how much Windex would be required to encourage ethical behavior on Capitol Hill...
I wonder if that much Windex is hazardous to be around...
I wonder how many people care if it is dangerous to the congress critters...
The only change I can believe in is what I find in my couch cushions.
"Sorry, your honor - I farted, then I just don't know what came over me..."
When I can't motivate to go to the pool to swim I open a bottle of chlorine and get a wiff of it (not like face in the bottle or anyting), it always reminds me how much I like swimming and how good it will feel if I get my stuff together and go. I think it is it a different thing to encourage a certain kind of behavior that you already want to do than discouraging stealing or slacking off at work.
I wonder if this means I can legally defend my assault against my coworker the next time he passes gas next to my cubicle?
The copper wiring one was clever, for a racist joke. The rest were lame.
they mop those out frequently with a bleach solution. ...ever notice that stale semen smells like chlorox?
SC Johnson.
I've got to the get the name of Windex's astroturf agency - brilliant marketing!
There might be undesirable side effects.
The Letterman and Governor sex scandals were precipitated by the fact that they work in environments that are slathered in woman's perfume. Some of the ingredients in them are synthesized smells of clean anus, which seems to drive these guys into ill-considered behavior. The pharmaceutical companies are lobbying and arm-twisting like crazy to keep that out of the media.
This sounds like the theory proposed in Fixing Broken Windows.
Cheers, ~ Ruben
Need time I dutch oven the missus, ill tell her I just want her to get real dirty :D
This is /., I didn't read TFA - but the summary reminded me of this book by John Brunner. IIRC he suggested that a (hypothetical) pheromone would help people cope with the stress of overpopulation, dropping the US murder rate to very low levels, among other effects ...
By logical extrapolation of this article, I presume this means that the Senate must then smell like dirty gym socks...
I'm glad to see I'm not the only person making this kind of spelling mistake in an otherwise intelligent post.
I like to believe that written language is different than spoken language, and is in fact richer in content since many written words render to the same spoken sound. As a person who reads and writes more than he speaks, I'd expect that my brain could keep homonyms straight with ease. But then my fingers go and type a word that sounds like the word I was thinking but is spelled differently and has a totally different meaning.
For knows/nose, I could at least suppose that part of your brain was composing an ending to that sentence involving 'knowledge' and volunteered that spelling when another part of your brain settled on the 'nose will tell you' phrase.
Why is my first thought the dad from My Big Fat Greek Wedding? The one who thought Windex cured everything. Got a sore elbow? Dip it in Windex. Feet ache? Soak them in Windex. Got a sore throat? Well, I'd rather not see that cure applied. Moral compass on the fritz? Apply a little Windex and you're good to go!
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
...promotes homosexual behaviour.
when someone farts in an elevator I have the unethical urge to beat them with their own shoes.
Good people go to bed earlier.
This seems to make pretty good sense. Take the fire service in America. Some volunteer fire departments take great pride in their firehouses and apparatus. They clean them regularly, train and drill on a regular basis, and project an image of "professionalism." Other departments, well, you can tell those that don't take as much pride in their equipment and house. The same would apply to just about anything else. If your people/family members/employees/slaves have pride in their enviornment, then that is reflected in their behavior.
They've done studies, you know. 60% of the time it works, every time.
"35-year-old Mindy Lanoux of San Antonio, who has melanoma that has spread to her liver and lungs, her odds of surviving in the single digits. She has been to the hospital 16 times in nine months, spending a week there each time for treatments so debilitating she wanted to give up. But she keeps returning, smearing peppermint oil under her nose when she walks in the medical center’s door to hide the odor.
“The smell gets to me,” Ms. Lanoux said. “It smells like cleaning products and the sickness and the medicines. It takes your brave edge off.”
From NY Times article on MD Anderson Cancer Center
I recently watched someone near the end of their life in that same hospital...it wasn't pleasant, despite the care givers' best efforts. I can imagine that there's some classical conditioning built up between the smells and sickness/death.
-- Political fascism requires a Fuhrer.
Okay, I'm going to call bullshit on this one.
This may or may not work on most of the populous (and the science behind it seems more than a little fishy) but for me, I find the exact opposite to be the case. Cleaners, perfume, deodorants, scented soaps, and other like products not only disgust me, but also produce symptoms similar to allergies in me (and several other people I know). If I smell Axe on someone, I immediately suspect that they're trying to cover up not having taken a shower. And if a place smells of bleach or ammonia... I wonder what the horrible mess was that necessitated bringing out the hardcore cleaning chemicals.
I don't suffer from insanity, I enjoy every minute of it! --Longbottle