https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2015/03/04/smell-the-glove
Smell the Glove.
Handshaking may be a chemical as well as a social greeting
GRIP firmly, maintain eye contact. What you do during a handshake is clear. But after? Research published this week suggests that humans, like other animals, use smell when they greet each other.
Noam Sobel of the Weizmann Institute of Science, in Israel, took note of an observation made by epidemiologists in 2008 about just how often people touch their faces. Dr Sobel had a hunch that it might have something to do with the gathering of scents—and could thus bear on the question of whether human beings secrete odiferous signalling molecules, sometimes known as pheromones.
Is there a metaphor it's referencing? I can't think of any.
Why is it the title of the article?
Best Answer
This is a reference to the mockumentary film This Is Spinal Tap, where the (fictional) band has an album called Smell The Glove.