What your sweat says about you
Here is what your sweat is telling you about your health.
You’re giving off good vibes
If you smile while you sweat, those around you smile too. At least, that’s what one Dutch study suggests. For the experiment, 36 women smelled sweat samples from 12 men who had watched videos meant to either scare them or make them happy. When a woman took a whiff of a scared guy’s samples, she was more likely to make a facial expression resembling fear. When she smelled the happy guy’s sweat, she was more likely to smile.
You’re depressed
In healthy people, environmental changes – things that make us scared, stressed, happy, or nervous – have an impact on both the volume and odour of sweat. But when a person is depressed, that response to stimuli declines. One German-Swedish study found that this reduced response was present in up to 97 percent of depressed patients who later committed suicide. “It was probably the case that certain nerve cells in the hippocampus are damaged by depression and negative stress,” Lars-Hakan Thorell, one of the researchers behind the study, said in a press release. “A depressed person has a biological inability to care about the surroundings, while a healthy person continues to react.”
Your fitness goals are on track
If you break a sweat earlier in a workout than usual, it doesn’t indicate that your endurance has fallen behind. In fact, it should signal the exact opposite. In one 2010 study, researchers found that fitter people not only tend to sweat at a greater volume, but they also start sweating sooner. “A high fitness level allows you to exercise at a higher workload, which generates more heat, which in turn leads to more sweat,” Craig Crandall, PhD, a professor of internal medicine, told Time.com.
You’re overcoming an illness
Think your partner smells a bit off this week? They might just be sick. One Psychological Science study found that healthy people are able to detect the amped-up immune system of someone fighting an infection. The results suggest that smell is an important warning signal against contagious illnesses.
Written by Juliana LaBianca. This article first appeared in Reader’s Digest. For more of what you love from the world’s best-loved magazine, here’s our best subscription offer.