Mythbusting Makeup: Skepticism and Cosmetic Claims

[Ian David]

There’s two things the general public are guaranteed to be concerned about: their health and the contents of their wallets. Yet somehow we are drawn to claims that you can make your thighs thin via a tube of goop and eagerly purchase promises of perfect complexions through using gunk best slapped on with a spatula.

Just look at any of the millions of products on supermarket shelves worldwide touting legally defensible scientific-sounding advertising gibberish (with no explicit claims as to what exactly the “life-enhancing collagen” will do for your dead hair follicles). Skepticism and questioning the pseudoscience in cosmetics should go together like the products’ endless promises of long-life and perfect skin. With that in mind, I set off to conduct a series of interviews over several months on this topic, hoping to get some sensible advice as to what to do when making up my mind about makeup.

When talking to people for the episode of the Token Skeptic podcast (“On Myths and Makeup”), I tracked down representatives from the United Kingdom, United States, and Australia. While all of them encouraged a skeptical outlook, they all had slightly different takes on the cosmetic industry and how laws in their countries deal with the more questionable efforts to promote products.

For my interview with a representative of the United States, I spoke to Perry Romanowski. He’s a member of the Beauty Brains Podcast and the Chemists Corner website, where he reviews cosmetic products and solves consumer problems. Perry has written and edited numerous articles and books, taught continuing education classes for industry scientists, and is the author of the book Beginning Cosmetic Chemistry.



More:
http://www.csicop.org/specialarticles/show/mythbusting_makeup_skepticism_and_cosmetic_claims

See also:

http://thebeautybrains.com/
http://chemistscorner.com/perry-romanowski/

[HuckleB]

1. K & R.