Raise your hand if this has happened to you before: You've bought a certain perfume because you admired it on a friend, but then completely hated it when you wore it yourself. Or you loved a fragrance at the store when you spritzed it on a tester card, but then ... didn't like it when you wore it yourself. We've all been there, and many of us have rows of full perfume bottles lined up on our dressers to prove it.
Fragrance isn't something you can impulse-buy, and there are two main reasons for this. One: Because all perfumes are composed of a top note, a middle note and a base note, they change over time -- the top note you noticed when you sprayed that card will totally change as the fragrance evaporates. And two: Your body chemistry has a major effect on a fragrance. What smells heavenly on your friend may not necessarily work for you.
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We don't know exactly how or why perfume molecules react with the skin differently on every person, but the body chemistry issue goes a lot deeper than just affecting the way a perfume smells on you. On the next page, we'll talk about a study that revealed a surprising subconscious factor that influences fragrance choices -- and, possibly, your choice of a mate.
