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designing a degree about smell

post #1 of 8
1/31/10 at 2:23pm
Thread Starter 
looking at my courses for the next five to seven years (i've done 2 undergrad sofar)
trying to come up with stuff i'd actually like to study
was thinking of calling the undergrad "clinical aromatherapy"
i know the courses i want to take and they're biochem biopsy and "perfume" related

i'd like to either work in a research setting and/or work with clients using hard science to treat or maintain mental health

thoughts on a name/course of study/way to design the degree?

i have the first in a series of essays about the degree i'd like to create due the 6th
any suggestions welcome
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post #2 of 8
1/31/10 at 7:00pm
Back when I went to college (the last millenium!) we had to pick a major out of the catalog, not create one. I guess professors were suspicious of what we'd make up.

Anyway, if you want to use fragrance to improve mental health you'll need a combination of chemistry, biology and psychology. It would probably be a psychology major with a minor in chemistry (so you can make your own) and some supporting work (maybe a self-study course) in olfactory receptors and their connections to the emotional and cognitive centers of the brain.

Maybe your first essay should track down any scientific papers that might have expored the efficacy and methods of aromatherapy. I started a thread on this, asking people for their experiences, and there was very little response. Some people suggested books or web sites that assert the value of aromatherapy. Others said that smelling a nice 'fume makes people happy and happy people heal better. You probably need more than that before you decide to invest 5-7 years.

Good luck & please post your experiences here.
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post #3 of 8
1/31/10 at 9:15pm
Thread Starter 
WOW! thank you so much
that helps me more than i can say and i'm actually going to follow your advice to the letter
including self study on aromatherapy and some perfumery courses, my school will give me credits for even unaccredited courses as long as i write papers about my experiences and learning.
awesome.
thank you.
you made my semester, and possibly the next 5-7 years of my academic career!
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post #4 of 8
2/1/10 at 9:45am
You should read "What The Nose Knows" by Avery Gilbert (he's a smell psychologist). Here's his blog: http://firstnerve.com/
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post #5 of 8
2/2/10 at 10:30am
Thread Starter 
nukapai!
i've spent the morning listening to interviews of avery from the press links on his blog
thank you so much
one of his things, morel?
has training programs
so now i think i can safely do the undergraduate in psychology with a minor in biology/biochem
then figure it out from there for the graduate work
so excited and interested
yeah!
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post #6 of 8
2/4/10 at 1:05pm
Cool! Good luck with it (and come back here to tell us how you got on).
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post #7 of 8
2/8/10 at 9:38pm
here are a few articles that you might find interesting (but you will need to use the computers at your universities library to access them).

http://ajh.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/19/6/381
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15314339
http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/j...TRY=1&SRETRY=0
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post #8 of 8
2/9/10 at 6:43am
Thread Starter 
thank you so much.
good way to wake up!
very sweet of you

-shamsi
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