The influence of olfactory concept on the probability of detecting sub- and peri-threshold components in a mixture of odorants

The headspace of apple juice was analysed to obtain an ecologically relevant stimulus model mixture of apple volatiles. Two sets of volatiles were made up: a set of eight supra-threshold volatiles (MIX) and a set of three sub-threshold volatiles. These sets were used to test the hypothesis that sub-threshold components can change the quality of a familiar smelling mixture of odorants when added to this mixture. In order to test this hypothesis, three successive dilutions of the sub-threshold volatiles were prepared in such a way that the strongest was at the threshold concentration and the two lower concentrations were below the threshold. The detection probabilities of the sub-threshold components in a blank stimulus were compared with the detectabilities in MIX. The sub- and peri-threshold volatiles were detected no better in MIX than in a blank. On the contrary, sub- and peri-threshold volatiles were better detected alone than when added to MIX. However, when the group of subjects was split into two sub-groups, employing either a rough or a detailed concept definition of the target stimulus, respectively, the subjects with highly refined concepts were better able to detect the presence of sub-threshold volatiles in MIX than those with poorly refined stimulus concepts. The effect of stimulus concept definition occurred independently of the proportions of correct detections of sub-threshold volatiles in a blank.