Body odor disgust sensitivity predicts authoritarian attitudes”

Disgust is a core emotion that is deemed to have evolved primary to prevent our contact with pathogens. Recent theories and evidence suggest that social disgust plays a role in socially conservative attitudes (e.g., opposing to gay marriage) and that disgust sensitivity relates to social conservatism in general. Body odors are potent triggers of disgust and regulate social behaviors in many species. In fact, olfaction has a prominent role in preventing the contact with pathogens.However, the relationship between body odor disgust sensitivity and social conservatism has been scarcely investigated. In two studies, we investigated whether body odor disgust would predict social conservatism. We used a new instrument, the Body Odor Disgust Scale (BODS) to test if disgust sensitivity to body odors (e.g., sweat) is a better predictor of holding socially conservative attitudes, measured by the Right-wing Authoritarianism Scale (RWA).Results show that body odor disgust sensitivity explained more variance in authoritarianism than did the two most commonly used measures of general disgust sensitivity. Furthermore, the relationship between general disgust sensitivity and authoritarianism was fully mediated by body odor disgust. Body odor perception is a primitive sensory system that supports pathogen detection as well as social regulation in mammals, and research on body odor disgust might provide key insights into the emotional foundations of social behavior and attitudes.