Men’s preferences for women’s body odours are not associated with HLA

Body odours reportedly portray information about an individual's genotype at the major histocompatibility complex (MHC, called human leucocyte antigen, HLA, in humans). While there is strong experimental support for MHC-associated mating behaviour in animals, the situation in humans is more complex. A lot of effort has been spent on testing HLA-associated odour preferences of women. To date, only very few studies have looked at HLA-linked olfactory preferences in men and these studies have revealed inconsistent results. Here, we investigate men's HLA-associated preferences for women's body odours. Importantly, and in contrast to previous studies, these odours were gathered at peak fertility (i.e. just before ovulation) when any HLA-associated odour preferences should be strongest. We scrutinized whether men's preference for women's body odours is influenced by (i) the number of shared HLA alleles between men and women, (ii) HLA heterozygosity, and (iii) the frequency of rare HLA alleles...

据报道，人体体味可传递个体主要组织相容性复合体（major histocompatibility complex，MHC；人类中又称人类白细胞抗原（human leucocyte antigen，HLA））的基因型信息。尽管已有坚实的实验证据支撑动物存在与MHC相关的交配行为，但人类的相关情形更为复杂。学界已投入大量精力，针对女性对HLA相关体味的偏好展开检验研究。迄今为止，仅有极少数研究探讨了男性的HLA关联嗅觉偏好，且此类研究的结果并不一致。本研究旨在探讨男性对女性体味的HLA相关偏好。值得注意的是，与既往研究不同，本研究采集体味的时间处于女性生育高峰期（即排卵前夕）——此时与HLA相关的体味偏好应最为显著。本研究细致考察了男性对女性体味的偏好是否受以下三方面因素影响：(1) 男女双方共享的HLA等位基因数量；(2) HLA杂合性；(3) 罕见HLA等位基因的频率……