Traditionally rosemary is said to be good for boosting memory, so many recommend smelling rosemary when studying.
In recent years the news has been circulating on the internet that even rosemary increases memory by 75% but can we really believe it?
Essential oils and plants have some benefits in many cases and when used judiciously but we should not blindly believe in all the potential miracle cures. For example, essential oils can be helpful and many use them to relieve the symptoms of chemotherapy, but we will never advise anyone to use essential oils or herbs to treat a malignant tumor or heart problem.
Let’s go back to memory… recently the snopes.com site, a site that has been trying to understand for years whether certain news is true or false, has tried to dispel the myth of rosemary and memory. The article is long but in a nutshell it tells us that the news came from the newspaper The Daily Mail, not particularly famous for the accuracy of the scientific news it publishes.
The original article was about a study that proved that rosemary increases memory by 75%. The study was really done but it tried to prove if a particular chemical component of rosemary oil increased memory.
In any case, there is no evidence that it is rosemary oil, a chemical component of it or simply the fact that the aromas can remind us of things related to the smell itself. In short, we have no conclusive evidence that rosemary oil does not improve memory but certainly there is no evidence that it improves it and we can certainly discard the hypothesis that it increases it by 75%.
If you think that smelling rosemary oil helps you to study, go ahead and do it, but don’t take everything you read on the internet at face value. Often it isn’t true.
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