Summary of PSYCOLOQUY topic Sex Odor

Topic:
Title & AuthorAbstract
6(33) THE SCENT OF EROS: MYSTERIES OF ODOR IN HUMAN SEXUALITY
by James Vaughn Kohl and Robert T. Francoeur
[New York: Continuum Publishing Company, 1995
14 chapters, 268 pages]
Precis by Kohl and Francoeur on Sex Odor
James Kohl
2621 Seashore Drive
Las Vegas, NV 89128
(702) 255-3414

jkohl@vegas.infi.net
Abstract: This Precis provides an overview of the book "The Scent of Eros: Mysteries of Odor in Human Sexuality," which details for a general audience a five-step biological pathway that allows the social environment to influence the genetic nature of mammalian behavior. This pathway is: gene-cell-tissue-organ-organ system. Moreover, though there are many environmental influences on genes, mammalian pheromones are the only known social-environmental stimuli that appear to activate gene expression in neurosecretory cells of tissue in the brain, an organ that is essential to any organ system involved in behavior. Human pheromones appear both to elicit a homologous "neuroendocrine" response and to influence behavior. Thus, human pheromones may fulfill the biological criteria required to link at least one aspect of a sensory-based, nurturing, social environment: olfaction, to the genetic nature of human behavior through a five-step pathway common to all terrestrial mammals and to many other vertebrates.

Keywords: behavioral development, genetics, gonadotropin, human sexuality, neuroanatomy, neuroendocrinology, odors, olfaction, pheromones, releasing hormone

7(12) MATE ATTRACTION OR MATE CONFIRMATION:
The Evolutionary Role of Pheromones
Book Review of Kohl on Sex-Odor
Edward Miller
Department of Economics and Finance
University of New Orleans
(504) 286-6913 (office)
(504) 286-6397 (fax)

emmef@UNO.edu
Abstract: The major absence from Kohl & Francoeur's (1995) book is an evolutionary perspective and an account of what function pheromones might serve in humans. For instance, there is a plausible function for menstrual synchrony. While Kohl and Francoeur's idea that pheromones might serve to attract mates is implausible, they could confirm the presence of a mate and adjust female fertility to whether any offspring was likely to benefit from male paternal investment.

Keywords: behavioral development, genetics, gonadotropin, human sexuality, neuroanatomy, neuroendocrinology, odors, olfaction, pheromones, releasing hormone