My younger brother would continue to cut his hair so it could grow more, faster and thicker. This happened when he was just starting to grow hair on his body and I was surprise at his theory of cutting hairs so they could grow back faster, thicker, and darker. I was confused because if you have to do shaving to cause hair to grow, then what would you need to do to hairs that you do not want to grow. Similar to what my brother thought, there are other things that we believe or agree like when we should expect that more gray hair will grow in areas where we tried to remove a previously existing one.
A lot of people believe that shaving makes hair grow faster, and thicker, and this was tested in 1928 by Mildred Trotter, a Forensic Anthropologist where 4 men shaved portion of their faces in a controlled environment and the hair were allowed to regrow naturally. The regrown hair and the one not shaved were compared and a conclusion was reached that shaving had no impact on hair regrowing.
Research has been ongoing on this and report from a 1970 studies where five men were asked to shave the hair on one of their legs each weeks for months while living the other leg hair unshaven. At the end of the study, shaving was seen not to have any significant impact on hair regrowth. So how did we begin to believe this myth?
It must have originated from experiences of people when they reach puberty and the hair starts to come out from the body. The hairs would certainly not come out as full as you would expect, rather it would come out little but the period of shaving and the fullness of hair on our body is a coincidence because as at the time when we start shaving, the body also experience series of hormonal fluctuations which helps in development.
As for the thickening of hair when we shave, it is because we are blunting the hair. On the body, the most visible part of the hair is the thinnest part so when we shave, we are cutting the hair shaft at its thickest point so when it comes out again, it appears thicker but becomes normal as time goes on. This is different for cases of waxing and pulling which removes the hair from the follicle itself.
One hair follicle will not produce two hair rather one hair follicle produces one hair and if for any chance you see two hairs coming from one point, then it is likely that two hair follicles merged together. When you undergo waxing, the hair regrows but the follicle undergoes trauma and if this continues for a long time, it would send signals to the brain requesting that its no longer needed causing the follicle to shrink and stop producing hair.
Reference
- https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022202X15478881/pdf?
- https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/fact-or-fiction
- https://www.healthline.com/health/does-shaving-make-hair-thicker
- https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/adult-health
- https://medium.com/@jcfmedicalcollege/does-shaving