People with more authoritarian attitudes are more likely to be disgusted by foul body odor, according to results of a study published in the medical journal Royal Society Open Science.
Researchers at Stockholm University in Sweden wanted to understand whether a person’s disgust with smell could reveal their political orientation. They asked 201 volunteers from around the world to complete an online survey about their sensitivity to odors.
Other questions in the survey measured the volunteers’ authoritarianism. These questions asked participants to what extent they agreed with authoritative statements that “old-fashioned ways are best to live in” and “we need a strong leader to face an immoral society.”
Odors and political orientations would be linked
This study showed that people who scored higher on smell disgust had a strong liking for right-wing authoritarianism. The team repeated their study with 160 US-based volunteers and one month before the 2016 US presidential election.
“Those who were most supportive of Donald Trump had the greatest sensitivity to body odor disgust,” explained Jonas Olofsson of Stockholm University in Sweden.
“Disgust is a universal human emotion that protects us from harmful substances. Many studies have shown that the kind of disgust we feel when we encounter something that could transmit disease also spreads into other emotions, such as disgust moral. People who are socially conservative, for example, seem more disgusted.”
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