Sound of freshness: Crafting multisensory experience in perfumery

Abstract

The current landscape of the perfume industry faces the challenge of enhancing product appeal and captivating consumers through innovation. Integrating multisensory elements into perfume experiences has the potential to drive this innovation forward. This research presents a novel methodology for characterizing sounds that evoke the perception of freshness in fragrances. Three experiments were conducted to explore the transferability of identified sound characteristics into the experience of certain fragrances. Experiment 1 assessed selected sounds to identify auditory parameters that effectively triggered primary freshness attributes. Based on these results, originally composed brand-aligned soundtracks were tested in Experiment 2 using the Implicit Association Test (IAT) to investigate associations with freshness and brand values. Experiment 3 examined whether these soundtracks effectively modulated the implicit olfactory experience of two commercial fragrances. The findings showed that the soundtracks successfully elicited specific enhanced effects in how people implicitly perceived the freshness of a fragrance. These outcomes revealed how soundtracks can enhance the perceptions of freshness attributes (e.g., cold, blue, light) in the fragrance experience, consistencies and variations between self-report and implicit measures, and practical applications in multisensory strategies for cosmetic companies.