Infant Visual Preference to Strawberry Enhanced by In-Season Odor

Abstract

We explored the ability of infants to recognize the smell of daily objects, including strawberries and tomatoes, by using a preferential-looking-technique. Experiment 1 was conducted while strawberries were in season. Thirty-seven infants aged 5- to 8-months were tested with a stimulus composed of a pair of photos of strawberries and tomatoes placed side by side and accompanied by a strawberry odor, a tomato odor, or no odors. Infants showed a preference for the strawberry picture when they smelled the congruent odor, but no such preference for the tomato picture. We conducted Experiment 2 (26 infant participants) while strawberries were out of season to reduce participant exposure to strawberries in their daily life. In Experiment 2, the olfactory-visual binding effect disappeared. This implies that visual-olfactory binding is triggered by an observer's experience. Together, these results suggest that infants can bind olfactory and visual information, and this ability depends on daily-life experience.