Is it dangerous to pick your nose?

On good morals

Whoever bets on the attractiveness of the forbidden is not necessarily right. It’s easy to see why scratching your nose can be so tempting Also explain as follows. Areas of the cerebral cortex associated with the sensation of the hand and face are fairly close together. This closeness may explain why it is not only comfortable to touch your face, but also to hold your finger up to your nose. But just because nose-plucking feels good doesn’t necessarily make it a sight to behold for others. Accordingly, it seems frowned upon not only here in this country, but in many cultures around the world.

If you do this anyway, you may not be in good company, but you will be in good company. in a study, It was published in the mid-1990s in the Journal of Clinical Psychology., 91% of respondents admitted to picking their nose regularly. The finger is supposed to go down On average four times a day in the nose. Admittedly, few scientific studies have addressed this phenomenon so far. Most of these refer to psychological surveys and conclude that nose sucking is very common – something most people are too shy to admit publicly.

However, nose picking is not an essential human trait. At least eleven other primate species do the same, including chimpanzees, gorillas, and orangutans. While people mostly secretly pick their noses, White-shouldered capuchin monkeys sometimes stick their fingers into the noses of other species – perhaps, one suspects, to build social bonds. In 2022, researchers from the University of Bern described in great detail how aye-ayes, a species of primate from the group of lemurs, choose their noses. Then they compared their behavior to primate species already known to be nose-picking. According to the study, they all have a high level of dexterity and an occasional marked preference for eating boogers afterwards.

Since nose-picking requires a certain degree of dexterity, it may be a phenomenon that only occurs in humans and our closely related species. But what is good? So far, science can only speculate on whether nose sucking is used solely to rid the nose of irritating buildups of mucus or whether it also performs other important functions.