10 ms·
I don’t know if this counts as a pheromone, but babies definitely emit _something_. As a recent father, I have had numerous people remark on how wonderful babie
by rp1 5y ago
I don’t know if this counts as a pheromone, but babies definitely emit _something_. As a recent father, I have had numerous people remark on how wonderful babies smell after smelling my child. I can’t smell anything. People who can smell this particular smell seem very perplexed that I can’t smell it.
- Flankk 5y agoHey Bobby, does this kid smell strange to you?
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- amelius 5y ago> As a recent father, I have had numerous people remark on how wonderful babies smell after smelling my child. Did you get these remarks from women, and were they aggressive (as the study says)?
- jtbayly 5y ago“Your baby smells so good!… … NO! I will not give her back now!”
- wruza 5y agoDo they have kids themselves by any chance? My theory is that it “turns on” once you become a parent, because almost every non-family male I knew at the time of my “research” found baby smell from repulsive to disgusting, while their mothers couldn’t get enough of it. Similar effect in how they look for different people.
- cambaceres 5y agoI have the same experience. The smell dissapears when they stop breastfeeding.
- slothtrop 5y agoI had developed a minor obsession with home security and we quipped that it must be the pheromones.
- UI_at_80x24 5y agoMy wife can smell it, but I can't.
- madcaptenor 5y agoThey definitely have a smell. It wears off after a couple months. My first kid stopped having the new baby smell before she started smiling, and that period in between was hard. (My second kid started smiling before the smell wore off. She's my favorite.)
- dr_dshiv 5y agoFor serious? The top of my kids heads smelled intoxicating for the first 6-9 months. There is still a special scent but not quite the same. And I smell it on other babies, too. It’s like smelling breast milk, but emanating from the Fontainelle
- conductr 5y agoI always just assumed it was some transition from vernix covered skin to skin with healthy bacteria which we distinguish as “no smell” but almost certainly has a smell. Baby skin is pretty awesome though, as alpha male as it sounds it definitely made me want extra cuddles /s
- colechristensen 5y agoTaste and smell are definitely not consistent between people.
- koolba 5y agoI’ve never tasted a baby but they definitely have a distinctive smell.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- jessaustin 5y agoI am not a father, but I have experienced this same effect from babies (related and unrelated) on numerous occasions.
- BiteCode_dev 5y agoIt would be funny if you could only smell it if it was your biological child. Although getting serious statistics on the matter is not easy, the estimated numbers can be surprisingly high (e.g: "One in 25 fathers is not biological parent": https://www.theguardian.com/society/2005/aug/11/childrensservices.uknews https://www.theguardian.com/society/2005/aug/11/childrensser...) If suddenly we discovered an easy way to give a hint you should do a DNA test, it could do some serious noise.
- belorn 5y agoIf one do the same experiment as the article describe, called the ultimatum game, and tell participants that further players will know about what decision players makes (reputation), administrating testosterone to players will result in more generosity. However if you tell players that you are giving them testosterone, regardless if it is true or not, it will then make players less generous. Studying human behavior is difficult. It is possible that only women can smell the pheromone, or it can be culture. Its hard to untangle unless one do blind studies.
- hvgk 5y agoThree kids here. I could never smell it either. To me babies mostly smell of poop and whatever medication of the hour you have slapped all over their bottom. One thing I have noticed is they smell worse as they get older :)
- GekkePrutser 5y agoI think that's just the smell of that Johnson's baby soap that everyone uses :P
- danielheath 5y agoThat soap is the worst! It gets rid of the 'new baby' smell. Who would want that?!?
- oseityphelysiol 5y agoI like brand new baby smell. But as soon as it stops smelling like it was assembled in China the novelty wears off.
- 6510 5y agoDon't spoil the trade secret!
- gambiting 5y agoLiterally never used any of that stuff on our baby, any baby wash we use for the bath is very specifically fragrance free, and yes, there is a very distinctive "baby smell" anyway.
- LAC-Tech 5y agoTotal emperors new clothes. They smell of baby powder and very faintly of urine.
- cmrdporcupine 5y agoMy two children smelled very different as babies. They both had smells, yes. They both smelled good. But entirely different smells. So I'm not sure there's a "baby smell", per se, so much as babies are prone to emitting smells. And because we're protective and they're cute we likely interpret those smells as pleasant. (Damn, now I want to have more babies, but we're almost 10 years past that possibility. And still nowhere close to grandkid babies.)
- xattt 5y agoSlightly related anecdote: one of my kids was born with a full head of hair. The hair was the softest thing I've ever interacted with in my entire life. We also have black cat with silky fur that usually feels soft. When the baby came home, the cat's fur might as well have been sandpaper. It took weeks for us to feel the cat's fur as his normal self. The thing here is that babies have this ethereal and indescribable effect on the people around them which postmodernist science is now trying understand.
- BlameKaneda 5y agoWhen I lived in my parents' home I couldn't smell anything about it. But whenever I go back there it has this distinctly earthy/wooden smell, and I'm sure it's what visitors smell when they visit it for the first time. Could the same thing (or similar) be happening with your kid, to where you're too used to being around them?
- alliao 5y agothe worst chemical warfare my kid did on me was when they were being breastfed. No matter how much sleep I had, no matter how energetic I felt, as soon as IT started latching and sucking away I just get so sleepy, always had to walk away to get anything done, otherwise I would've just napped right there and then!
- GenerocUsername 5y agoShould have just napped then. Stop trying to fight yourself
- alliao 5y agoYou're right, I eventually scheduled my life around feeding/napping time. Previously I thought that's the free time when I can go away to do some chores such naivety in the face of chemical warfare perfected through evolution hah
- chapium 5y agoPuppies also have puppy smell. After having a puppy, I’m convinced that smell is urine.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- gremlinsinc 5y agowow, you had a puppy? How'd that happen?
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- lotsofpulp 5y agoHuman baby urine soaked Kirkland diapers smell like Corn Flakes cereal to me.
- ccalloway 5y agoThe absorbent stuff in diapers is basically corn starch.
- persedes 5y agoIsn't it sodium polyacrylate? I've learned that e.g. hello fresh uses the same stuff in their ice packs.
- lotsofpulp 5y agoThat would explain it! Thanks.
- keyle 5y agoWait till they start solids and you'll definitely smell something that won't make you more docile but run away!
- gnicholas 5y agoI thought my babies smelled nice, but always assumed it was the baby shampoo or diapers, both of which had a scent. I suppose it's possible the nice smell came from the babies themselves, but it'd be hard to disentangle — especially since much of the supposed scent comes from the head, which also smells of baby shampoo.
- in_cahoots 5y agoCompletely anecdotal, but I use scent-free soap, diapers, and detergent, and was never able to identify anything special about my baby’s smell. We didn’t bathe him at the hospital either so in theory his smell was as close to ‘natural’ as you can get.
- rp1 5y agoI don’t think it’s baby shampoo because my partner and I both smell the shampoo, but she smells something else as well. She’s smelled the same smell since the day the baby was born, before we bathed her or put a diaper on.
- racl101 5y agoAgree. As an uncle I remember smelling top of baby's soft spot and thinking it was pleasant. Maybe it was the Johnson's product or talcum or some other baby product. Of course, they can also smell like mother's milk if they puke it up and that shit smells sour. I've also noticed puppies have a pleasant smell to before they get older and their breath stinks cause the owners don't brush their teeth enough.
- unobatbayar 5y agoOff topic: You can't smell anything from baby's excrement until they start eating meat.
- meepmorp 5y agoThis is wrong.
- sekl 5y agoAny solids. We recently started with fruits for a short while because that’s what our pediatrician recommended and the smell immediately got bad. Like real bad. Transitioned to vegetables and proteins and it got even worse though. As a side note my wife and I are convinced going fruits first was not ideal as our 6 month old now loves her fruits but hates her veggies. We saw this coming but figured it better to listen to our pediatrician.
- fartcannon 5y agoIf my experience is anything to go on, starting with vegetables and meat, and complex flavours like curry only gets you a few weeks of thinking it worked but the fruit and white bread will eventually win.
- gambiting 5y agoHave you ever had a baby? As a father of a 7 month old who was exclusively breasfed until last month - you can definitely smell their poop. It wasn't a very strong smell, but it was there. And now that he started eating solids(but no meat yet!) his poop is proper smelly, and don't get me started on his farts.
- gadders 5y agoThis reminds me a bit of the start of the book Perfume by Patrick Suskind.