Stress, unhealthy habits affect hair loss
New findings suggest that hair loss is associated with many unhealthy habits and stressful conditions rather than just people’s genetic backgrounds.
A series of studies about male and female identical twins showed that hair loss is not just ruled by genes but also by habits such as smoking, heavy drinking, sun exposure and being in stressful conditions.
According to the new findings environmental factors are more influential on women’s hair loss, while men are more affected by genetics.
Researchers at Case Western Reserve University studied 90 male and 98 female identical twins through recording their lifestyle patterns, testing their blood and photo analysis of hair.
”Twins are genetically destined to have the same number of hairs,” said senior researcher Dr. Bahman Guyuron. ”And if one has fewer it means that it is related to outside factors.”
Results showed that women with more stable marriages are less likely to experience hair loss compared to their twin sisters who had faced stress caused by being widowed or divorced.
Having a higher income, multiple children, higher blood pressure, wearing hats and drinking coffee were also found to be influential in women’s hair loss.
Although genes are the most important predictor of balding in men, there are some habitual and lifestyle factors also affecting hair loss.
Investigations revealed that men who used to drink, smoke, be less active or experience more stress or sun exposure were at a higher risk of losing hair than their twin brothers, who did not follow the same unhealthy life patterns.
Researchers concluded that stress plays the most significant role among environmental factors in triggering hair loss in both genders.
”What we can say is that we identified factors that appear to both raise risk and lower risk, for both men and women, independent of genetic disposition,” said Guyuron who is scheduled to present her teams' findings at the 2011 annual meeting of the American Society of Plastic Surgery in Denver.
”What is amazing is how many of these twins have exactly the same behaviors, the same things matching except one or two factors that possibly may contribute to these differences,” she added.
Source: presstv.ir
