A new study found that people are more likely to give away money and volunteer their time when they're in a clean-smelling room. Researchers conducted two experiments. In the first, the participants were given $12 cash and told that an anonymous partner in the next room expected them to divide it fairly. In practice, the folks in the clean-smelling room returned nearly twice as much money as those in the non-scented room. In the second experiment, participants in both rooms were asked how willing they would be to donate time and money to the charitable organization Habitat for Humanity. Participants in the clean-scented room not only were more willing to volunteer time, 22 percent of them were likely to donate money, compared to only 6 percent of those in the unscented room.
