Gender differences in chemosensory perception and event-related potentials

Abstract

The present study investigated chemosensory gender differences by means of ratings of total nasal chemosensory intensity, unpleasantness and sensory irritation and simultaneous recordings of chemosensory event-related potentials (CSERPs) for three concentrations of the olfactory/trigeminal stimulus pyridine in 19 women and 17 men, all young adults. Results show that, compared to men, women gave higher intensity and unpleasantness ratings, in particular for the highest stimulus concentration. The gender differences in perceived intensity are reflected in the signal-to-noise ratio of the individual CSERP averages, revealing more identifiable early components (P1, N1) in women than in men. The late positive component, labeled P2/P3, displayed larger amplitudes at all electrode sites and shorter latencies at Cz, in women compared to men. The effects of increased pyridine concentration on perception (larger in women) and CSERPs (similar across gender) imply that the two measures involve partially different neural processing. CSERP component identifiability is proposed here as a general means of assessing signal-to-noise ratio of the CSERPs.