My Baby's Poop Doesn't Smell
Robert Paul Reyes
July 17, 2006
It's not unusual to find a baby playing with its own feces, but some scientists also seem to be fascinated with fecal matter.
Some scientists study global warming or String Theory, while others research the effects of a baby's poop on his mother. The doo-doo has finally hit the fan, why do we allow money to be wasted on frivolous studies?
In a new study led by a scientist from Macquarie University in Australia, 13 mums were asked to sniff crappy diapers belonging to both their own child and others from an unrelated baby. The mothers consistently ranked the smell of their own infant's excrement as less revolting than that of other Munchkins.
I'm glad I'm not the lowly assistant who was assigned the task of recruiting mothers for this study: "You want me to do what? Smell my baby's soiled diapers? And sniff the dirty diapers of other babies? Get out of here, you sick pervert, before I call the cops!"
I'm not surprised that mothers think their baby's waste matter doesn't smell, every Mom thinks that her little one is God's gift to humanity. "My Timmy is only 11 months old and if his fingers weren't so little he would be able to send an email to his grandma." "That's nothing my baby created her own Web site and she gets more hits than the Drudge Report."
But what's really surprising is that the effect persisted even when the soiled diapers were purposely mislabeled.
The researchers think that the mothers were simply more accustomed to their baby's rank smell and therefore found it less nauseating. I have a friend who has four cats and a dog, her house smells like an animal shelter, but she is totally oblivious to the awful smell.
This study will appear in a future issue of Evolution and Human Behavior. Who would have thunk that a journal with such a prestigious and scholarly sounding name would document such a silly study?
Some scientists study global warming or String Theory, while others research the effects of a baby's poop on his mother. The doo-doo has finally hit the fan, why do we allow money to be wasted on frivolous studies?
In a new study led by a scientist from Macquarie University in Australia, 13 mums were asked to sniff crappy diapers belonging to both their own child and others from an unrelated baby. The mothers consistently ranked the smell of their own infant's excrement as less revolting than that of other Munchkins.
I'm glad I'm not the lowly assistant who was assigned the task of recruiting mothers for this study: "You want me to do what? Smell my baby's soiled diapers? And sniff the dirty diapers of other babies? Get out of here, you sick pervert, before I call the cops!"
I'm not surprised that mothers think their baby's waste matter doesn't smell, every Mom thinks that her little one is God's gift to humanity. "My Timmy is only 11 months old and if his fingers weren't so little he would be able to send an email to his grandma." "That's nothing my baby created her own Web site and she gets more hits than the Drudge Report."
But what's really surprising is that the effect persisted even when the soiled diapers were purposely mislabeled.
The researchers think that the mothers were simply more accustomed to their baby's rank smell and therefore found it less nauseating. I have a friend who has four cats and a dog, her house smells like an animal shelter, but she is totally oblivious to the awful smell.
This study will appear in a future issue of Evolution and Human Behavior. Who would have thunk that a journal with such a prestigious and scholarly sounding name would document such a silly study?
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