Follow your nose to find an unlikely performance booster

December’s dark nights and short days are well established as we move towards the winter solstice. It is a time when we go to work in the dark and come home in the dark. Combined with the potentially colder and wetter weather, there is the inclination to spend more time indoors. This makes us more prone to viruses: colds and flu, and of course COVID is still prevalent.

When we were forced to stay at home during the COVID lockdowns, we realised how important it was to get out into the natural environment. The positive impact of nature on our general physical and mental health, our emotions and mood and our immune systems is well documented and promoted. The benefits of viewing nature include a reduction in anxiety and stress, a lower heart rate and increased directed attention, ie increased cognitive function. While there has been a focus on the visual impact of nature, more attention is being turned towards investigating the impact of the natural environment on the other senses and their combination. You will all be familiar with the use of recordings of whale song, the breaking surf and forest noises to help relaxation and meditation.

There is one sense that is the poor relation to the other four and, like many things, you take it for granted until it is gone. When I caught the milder strain of COVID earlier this year, it was the loss of the sense of smell that I was most indignant about. Since it has been restored, I have been much more appreciative of it. I have also been more attuned to information on the benefits that can be gained through the sense of smell, beyond the obvious ones of pleasure derived from the scent of flowers, recently mown grass, sea water and seaweed and, of course, the warning that food has gone off. I discovered that unlike sight and hearing, the olfactory nerves are linked directly to the part of the brain that plays a part in learning and memory. There is also a direct link between the sense of smell and the limbic system, which governs emotions and behaviour. Studies have shown that there is a direct relationship between olfactory function and cognitive function: an increase in olfactory function increases cognitive function; a decrease leads to cognitive impairment.

One way of increasing cognitive performance is by getting sufficient sleep. Lavender has long been promoted as influencing better sleep but be warned: after an ‘innovative’ chef put lavender in my mash, I did not sleep very well. Despite this, there are many other plant odours that may have positive benefits. A study has shown that people exposed to higher levels of rosemary aroma demonstrated increased speed and accuracy when performing visual processing tasks and serial subtraction tasks. Additional research is necessary to demonstrate consistent cognitive benefits. Cypress and hinoki odours are purported to benefit the respiratory system.

So, how can this be applied to non-destructive testing (NDT), where the working environment is tightly constrained by the location of the component requiring inspection. The influence of temperature, noise and lighting conditions on operator cognitive performance has been the subject of many a human factors study and is understood. With the increasing use of technology, more of the cognitive activity, applied in the analysis of digital signals, is able to be performed away from the component’s immediate surroundings in temporary buildings and offices on site, or even remotely off site. This, in turn, increases the flexibility in manipulating the visual and aural environment to assist cognitive efficiency. Remember the recent mention of the cathedral effect? Higher ceilings promote abstract thought and creativity, while lower ceilings promote more detailed and concrete thinking.

The role of olfactory stimuli in improving cognitive efficiency has not been widely studied in general and, as far as I know, not at all in NDT. I suggest that it is worthy of investigation, not only to quantify the benefits, but also to establish safe levels of exposure and any potential health side effects. It could offer some easy wins: low cost of implementation at either the organisation or individual level, improved performance (incremental gains), a happier workforce and a more pleasant working environment.

I would like to thank you for reading these articles throughout the year and I wish you and your families a very Happy Christmas.

Please note that the views expressed in this column are the author’s own personal ramblings for the purpose of encouraging discussion within NDT News. They do not represent the views of Amentum or BINDT.

Letters can be mailed to The Editor, NDT News, Midsummer House, Riverside Way, Bedford Road, Northampton NN1 5NX, UK. Email: ndtnews@bindt.org or email Bernard McGrath direct at bernard.mcgrath1@global.amentum.com