Ever met someone you immediately knew you'd be friends with?
Was it their smile? A joke they told? Their sweet Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon tee?
According to a new study, the clincher might've been far funkier: their B.O. Researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel found that people with similar body odors are more likely to “click” and become fast friends.
Researchers recruited 20 same-sex besties, all of whom agreed they instantly connected upon meeting. An electronic “nose” and a group of 25 adults were used to sniff t-shirts that had been worn by each participant for a few nights.
The e-nose and human sniffers found the body odors of friends were more similar than those of random pairs. In a follow-up experiment, the research team found that 71 percent of the time, similarities in body odor predicted whether strangers would feel a positive connection.
Bottom line: we're far more similar to our butt-sniffing dogs than we thought.
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