Seeing odors in color: Cross-modal associations in children and adults from two cultural environments

•We explored odor-color cross-modal associations in French and American children and adults.•Non-random odor-color associations were observed from age 6 in both cultural groups.•Children and adults' associations were dependent on cultural and developmental experience with odors.•These results underscore the importance of exposure learning in odor-color associations.

We investigated the occurrence and underlying processes of odor-color associations in French and American 6- to 10-year-old children (n = 386) and adults (n = 137). Nine odorants were chosen according to their familiarity to either cultural group. Participants matched each odor with a color, gave hedonic and familiarity judgments, and identified each odor. By 6 years of age, children displayed culture-specific odor-color associations, but age differences were noted in the type of associations. Children and adults in both cultural groups shared common associations and formed associations that were unique to their environment, underscoring the importance of exposure learning in odor-color associations.