- Pheremone perfume is a compound made of synthetic animal musk and chemicals that stimulate the nose.
- It's designed to make you smell sexier to others — but it's unclear if humans can detect pheromones.
- One study found the opposite: You may be more attracted to others by wearing pheromone-like products.
- Visit Insider's Health Reference library for more advice.
Pheromones are chemical compounds that can trigger sexual attraction — at least that's how it works in the animal kingdom.
Scientists aren't yet sure if humans can sense pheromones, but many perfumes on the market claim to have ingredients that can make you more attractive to others.
While research on pheromone perfumes is limited, early studies suggest it's possible they could work. Here's what the research says.
What are pheromones?
Pheromones are scents that animals use to send out signals to other animals. These scents can be used to mark territory, identify each other, or attract a mate, says Kerry Hughes, MSc, an ethnobotanist and clinical herbalist in private practice and author of the Botanicals With Benefits series.
Animals produce pheromones using scent glands found all over the body, including the mouth, paws, or anus. They may urinate or rub their bodies on trees to mark their territory, or sniff each other's rear ends to identify family or a mate.
"We can see examples of this throughout the animal kingdom — in dogs, cats, horses, and so on," says Pamela Regan, PhD, a psychology professor who studies sexual and romantic attraction at California State University, Los Angeles.
Many animals pick up pheromones using receptors in their nostrils called the vomeronasal organ. Humans have this organ as well, but researchers still aren't sure whether we actually use it, or if we give off any pheromones to sense.
What is pheromone perfume?
Like how animals use pheromones to attract a mate, pheromone perfume is supposed to inspire sexual attraction in the people who smell you.
According to Hughes, the ingredients in pheromone perfumes may include Epi-androsterone, Alpha-androstano, Androstadienone, and Androstenone. These are synthetic versions of:
- Axillary steroids like androstenol and androstenone that come from male sweat glands.
- Aliphatic acids, or "copulins" produced by the vaginal wall.
- Various chemicals that supposedly stimulate the vomeronasal system.
Pheromone perfumes may also contain artificial versions of musk from animals like civet cats, beavers, pigs, and musk deer, Regan says.
However, perfume fragrances aren't regulated by the FDA beyond ensuring that they're safe for humans, so companies don't need to disclose their ingredients.
"If they just say it has pheromones, but there is no information on any company materials, then it seems even more suspect," Hughes says.
Can pheromone perfume make people more attracted to you?
To know whether pheromone perfumes actually work, Regan says, we need to answer three questions:
- Do humans give off pheromones?
- Can humans sense pheromones?
- Do humans have a sexual attraction response to pheromones?
Though we aren't clear on the answers to any of these questions — here's what we know so far.
1. Do humans give off pheromones?
Humans have plenty of odor-producing glands in our armpits, nipples, and genital areas. But what's unclear is whether those odors contain pheromones.
One older study from 2004 suggests it could be a possibility. The researcher found that compounds like androstenone, which acts as a pheromone for pigs, are also present in human sweat and urine.
"So, we know that humans give off body odor and that human bodies excrete substances that pigs find sexually stimulating," Regan says.
But whether humans find androstenone, or other compound secretions, sexually stimulating is the main question that has yet to be answered.
2. Can humans sense pheromones?
Experts don't know for sure if we can detect pheromones, but our sense of smell may offer a clue.
"Scientists have found that human infants, children, and adults are able to discriminate between other individuals on the basis of olfactory cues — we can tell each other apart using our noses," Regan says.
This indicates that we give off and pick up scents from each other that act in the same way as animals use pheromones.
3. Do humans have a sexual attraction response to pheromones?
If human pheromones exist — and that's a big "if" — then it's possible that spritzing yourself with a pheromone perfume may actually make you more attractive, according to limited research.
For example, a small 2008 study looked at how the hormone androstadienone affects women's feelings of attraction. The study set up a speed dating trial in which some women had androstadienone applied to their upper lips, while others had a non-hormone solution.
The results showed that the women with androstadienone rated the men they met as more attractive, while the untreated women gave lower ratings.
This result shows a slightly different picture — in this case, pheromones made the wearer more attracted to others, rather than attracting other people to them.
However, other experts have noted that more research is still needed to understand if human pheromones enhance your attractiveness and "there is little proof in the form of controlled clinical trials that this is the case," Hughes says. In fact, many studies supporting human pheromones are small and may show false positives.
Human attraction is also more complex than other mammals — "we don't require the presence of a particular hormone or chemical secretion to feel desire, want sex, or become attracted to another member of the species," Regan says.
This means that even if pheromone perfumes work, they may not be enough to change a person's attraction to you.
Insider's takeaway
So far, we don't have much evidence that wearing a pheromone perfume can make you more attractive to others. Humans may give off and sense pheromones, but more research is needed before we can determine exactly how this works.
"I'd recommend simply buying any fragrance that appeals to you — and if your partner likes it, too, that's a bonus," Regan says.