An Objective and Quantitative Evaluation of Intermittent Aroma Stimuli on Intellectual Concentration

Smell is one of the environmental factors in office and it may affect workers’ performance. Although good smell, aroma has been studied on its effect to improve comfort and relaxation, few studies discusses its utilization to improve workers’ intellectual concentration in office. In this study, intermittent aroma stimulus while working has been proposed to improve their intellectual concentration and work efficiency and an evaluation experiment was conducted where concentration index was measured under aroma stimulus condition and no aroma condition. As the result, it was found that the intellectual concentration under the aroma stimulus condition was significantly higher than that under no aroma condition. Subjective questionnaires’ results showed that participants also felt marginally significantly more comfort and more feeling of their performance improved under the aroma stimulus condition.