Essential Oils and Emotion

Emotions With Essential Oils

When you inhale a fragrance, its scent molecules enter your nose, where
they remain in a part of the nasal lining (the olfactory membrane). Within this lining is the olfactory
epithelium, a specialised tissue containing receptor neurons (nerve cells) that become containers for the
scent molecules.
But these neurons don’t just trap the scent molecules and hold them inside the nose. They also send
electrical impulses to the brain’s olfactory bulb, the centre of the sense of smell. The olfactory bulb then

signals the amygdala, an area of the brain that contains emotional memories. (This is why the sense of
smell is such an immediate trigger for remembering long-ago feelings and events.) The olfactory bulb also
distributes signals to the sense of taste, housed in the gustatory centre, and this signalling is what makes
aromas a key factor in how food tastes.
Olfaction—the sense of smell—is the only one of the five senses that is directly connected to the limbic
system, the part of the brain that controls blood pressure, heart rate, and breathing as well as memory
and hormone balance. (The other senses—hearing, sight, taste, and touch—are all connected to the
thalamus, another region of the brain.) The limbic system regulates fear, anger, depression, anxiety,
happiness, and sadness, and it is believed that a scent entering the olfactory bulb has the ability to affect
all these emotional responses.

Notes
1. “What Is Aromatherapy?,” National Association for Holistic Aromatherapy, accessed June 23, 2014,
http://www.naha.org/explore-aromatherapy/about-aromatherapy/what-is-aromatherapy.
2. “Lavender and Tea Tree Oils May Cause Breast Growth in Boys,” National Institutes of Health, US Department of
Health and Human Services, NIH News, January 31, 2007, http://www.nih.gov/news/pr/jan2007/niehs-31.htm.