Responses of rats to sex odors.

Abstract
Reactions to odors from receptive and nonreceptive female rats were observed in 29 sexually experienced males, 24 naive males, and 23 castrates. Sex experience and odor preference tests took place in S''s home cage. Experienced males preferred receptive female odor over nonreceptive female odor (p .< .001), but naive males and castrates showed no preference. In another experiment, reactions of 29 sexually experienced and 30 naive females, 1/2 of each group receptive and 1/2 nonreceptive, to odors from normal and castrated males were observed. Experienced and naive-receptive females preferred the normal male odor (p< .05), but the naive-nonreceptive females showed no preference.