New findings challenge the traditional view of five senses, proposing that humans could have between 22 and 33 distinct ones. These senses blend to create our perception of the world, influencing everything from taste to balance. Experts at the University of London highlight how everyday experiences reveal this complexity.
Traditional accounts, dating back to Aristotle, describe human perception through five senses: sight, sound, smell, touch, and taste. However, modern research indicates this framework is incomplete. Professor Charles Spence from Oxford's Crossmodal Laboratory estimates that neuroscience colleagues recognize anywhere from 22 to 33 senses.
Among these are proprioception, which allows awareness of limb positions without visual cues, and the vestibular system for balance, integrating ear canals, sight, and proprioception. Interoception monitors internal states like heart rate or hunger, while senses of agency and ownership can falter in stroke patients, leading some to feel detached from their own limbs.
Taste emerges not as a single sense but a fusion of touch, smell, and gustation—the detection of salt, sweet, sour, bitter, and umami on the tongue. Fruit flavors like raspberry arise from combined olfactory and tactile inputs, with smell providing the dominant contribution to flavor as odor compounds travel from mouth to nose during chewing.
Interactions abound: shampoo scents alter hair texture perception, with rose making it feel silkier, and low-fat yogurts seem richer due to odors. Aircraft noise diminishes perceptions of salt, sweet, and sour but enhances umami, explaining why tomato juice tastes better in flight.
The Centre for the Study of the Senses at the University of London's School of Advanced Study explores these through its 2013 Rethinking the Senses project, led by the late Professor Sir Colin Blakemore. Findings include how altered footstep sounds affect perceived body weight and how immersive audioguides at Tate Britain improve recall of painting details.
An ongoing exhibition, Senses Unwrapped at London's King's Cross Coal Drops Yard, demonstrates illusions like the size-weight effect, where smaller objects feel heavier despite equal mass. Barry Smith, director of the Institute of Philosophy there, emphasizes pausing to notice these multisensory processes in daily life.
