Glossary
Odor Adaptation — Glossary
The nose's tendency to tune out constant smells — why you stop smelling your own home's pet odor.
Odor adaptation is your olfactory system filtering out unchanging background smells — after continuous exposure your receptors stop reporting the constant odor. You go “nose-blind” to your own home.
It is why guests smell your pets and you do not — and why returning from vacation briefly restores the perception.