Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

Chemical/straightening and other hair product usage during childhood, adolescence, and adulthood among African-American women: potential implications for health

Journal of Exposure Science & Environmental Epidemiology volume 30, pages 86–96 (2020)Cite this article

Abstract

Few studies have characterized life course hair product usage beyond ever/never. We investigated hair product use from childhood to adulthood, usage patterns in adulthood, and socioeconomic status (SES) correlates among African-American (AA) women. Using self-reported data from 1555 AA women enrolled in the Study of Environment, Lifestyle, and Fibroids (2010–2018), we estimated the usage frequency of chemical relaxer/straightener (≥twice/year, once/year, and rarely/never) and leave-in/leave-on conditioner (≥once/week, 1–3 times/month, and rarely/never) during childhood, adolescence, and adulthood. Latent class analysis was used to identify patterns of adulthood usage of multiple hair products. SES was compared across latent classes. With a mean age of 33 ± 3.4 years, most women reported ever using chemical relaxers/straighteners (89%), and use ≥twice/year increased from childhood (9%) to adolescence (73%) but decreased in adulthood (29%). Leave-in/leave-on conditioner use followed the same pattern. Each of three identified latent classes reported frequent styling product use and infrequent relaxer/straightener use. Class One was unlikely to use any other products, Class Two moderately used shampoo and conditioner, and Class Three frequently used multiple product types (e.g., moisturizers and conditioners). Participants in the latter two classes reported higher SES. Ever/never characterization may miss important and distinctive patterns of hair product use, which may vary by SES.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Relevant articles

Open Access articles citing this article.

Access options

Rent or buy this article

Get just this article for as long as you need it

$39.95

Learn more

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Fig. 1
Fig. 2

References

  1. James-Todd T, Senie R, Terry MB. Racial/ethnic differences in hormonally-active hair product use: a plausible risk factor for health disparities. J Immigr Minor Health. 2012;14:506–11.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  2. Li ST, Lozano P, Grossman DC, Graham E. Hormone-containing hair product use in prepubertal children. Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med. 2002;156:85–6.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  3. Tiwary CM. A survey of use of hormone/placenta-containing hair preparations by parents and/or children attending pediatric clinics. Mil Med. 1997;162:252–6.

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  4. Tiwary CM, Ward JA. Use of hair products containing hormone or placenta by US military personnel. J Pediatr Endocrinol Metab. 2003;16:1025–32.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  5. Wu XM, Bennett DH, Ritz B, Cassady DL, Lee K, Hertz-Picciotto I. Usage pattern of personal care products in California households. Food Chem Toxicol. 2010;48:3109–19.

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  6. Helm JS, Nishioka M, Brody JG, Rudel RA, Dodson RE. Measurement of endocrine disrupting and asthma-associated chemicals in hair products used by Black women. Environ Res. 2018;165:448–58.

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  7. Lewallen R, Francis S, Fisher B, Richards J, Li J, Dawson T, et al. Hair care practices and structural evaluation of scalp and hair shaft parameters in African American and Caucasian women. J Cosmet Dermatol. 2015;14:216–23.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  8. Zota AR, Shamasunder B. The environmental injustice of beauty: framing chemical exposures from beauty products as a health disparities concern. Am J Obstet Gynecol. 2017;217:418 e411–418 e416.

    Google Scholar 

  9. Johnson TA, Bankhead T. Hair it is: examining the experiences of Black women with natural hair. Open J Soc Sci. 2014;2:86–100.

    Google Scholar 

  10. James-Todd T, Terry MB, Rich-Edwards J, Deierlein A, Senie R. Childhood hair product use and earlier age at menarche in a racially diverse study population: a pilot study. Ann Epidemiol. 2011;21:461–5.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  11. McDonald JA, Tehranifar P, Flom JD, Terry MB, James-Todd T. Hair product use, age at menarche and mammographic breast density in multiethnic urban women. Environ Health. 2018;17:1.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  12. Wise LA, Palmer JR, Reich D, Cozier YC, Rosenberg L. Hair relaxer use and risk of uterine leiomyomata in African-American women. Am J Epidemiol. 2012;175:432–40.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  13. Giulivo M, Lopez de Alda M, Capri E, Barcelo D. Human exposure to endocrine disrupting compounds: Their role in reproductive systems, metabolic syndrome and breast cancer. A review. Environ Res. 2016;151:251–64.

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  14. De Coster S, van Larebeke N. Endocrine-disrupting chemicals: associated disorders and mechanisms of action. J Environ public health. 2012;2012:713696.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  15. Cesario SK, Hughes LA. Precocious puberty: a comprehensive review of literature. J Obstet Gynecol Neonatal Nurs. 2007;36:263–74.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  16. Llanos AAM, Rabkin A, Bandera EV, Zirpoli G, Gonzalez BD, Xing CY, et al. Hair product use and breast cancer risk among African American and White women. Carcinogenesis. 2017;38:883–92.

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  17. Jiang C, Hou Q, Huang Y, Ye J, Qin X, Zhang Y, et al. The effect of pre-pregnancy hair dye exposure on infant birth weight: a nested case-control study. BMC Pregnancy Childbirth. 2018;18:144.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  18. Ahn C, McMichael A, Smith P. The impact of hair care practices and attitudes toward hair management on exercise habits in African American women. J Am Acad Dermatol. 2014;70:Ab93–Ab93.

    Google Scholar 

  19. Ahn CS, Suchonwanit P, Foy CG, Smith P, McMichael AJ. Hair and Scalp Care in African American Women Who Exercise. JAMA Dermatol. 2016;152:579–80.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  20. Bowen F, O’Brien-Richardson P. Cultural hair practices, physical activity, and obesity among urban African-American girls. J Am Assoc Nurse Pract. 2017;29:754–62.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  21. Eyler AE, Wilcox S, Matson-Koffman D, Evenson KR, Sanderson B, Thompson J, et al. Correlates of physical activity among women from diverse racial/ethnic groups. J Womens Health Gend Based Med. 2002;11:239–53.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  22. Hall RR, Francis S, Whitt-Glover M, Loftin-Bell K, Swett K, McMichael AJ. Hair care practices as a barrier to physical activity in African American women. JAMA Dermatol. 2013;149:310–4.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  23. Harley AE, Odoms-Young A, Beard B, Katz ML, Heaney CA. African American social and cultural contexts and physical activity: strategies for navigating challenges to participation. Women Health. 2009;49:84–100.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  24. Huebschmann AG, Campbell LJ, Brown CS, Dunn AL. “My hair or my health:” overcoming barriers to physical activity in African American women with a focus on hairstyle-related factors. Women Health. 2016;56:428–47.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  25. Im EO, Ko Y, Hwang H, Yoo KH, Chee W, Stuifbergen A, et al. “Physical activity as a luxury”: African American women’s attitudes toward physical activity. West J Nurs Res. 2012;34:317–39.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  26. Joseph RP, Ainsworth BE, Keller C, Dodgson JE. Barriers to physical activity among African American women: an integrative review of the literature. Women Health. 2015;55:679–99.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  27. Joseph RP, Coe K, Ainsworth BE, Hooker SP, Mathis L, Keller C. Hair as a barrier to physical activity among African American women: a qualitative exploration. Front Public Health. 2017;5:367.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  28. Pekmezi D, Marcus B, Meneses K, Baskin ML, Ard JD, Martin MY, et al. Developing an intervention to address physical activity barriers for African-American women in the deep south (USA). Womens Health. 2013;9:301–12.

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  29. Taylor WC, Yancey AK, Leslie J, Murray NG, Cummings SS, Sharkey SA, et al. Physical activity among African American and Latino middle school girls: consistent beliefs, expectations, and experiences across two sites. Women health. 1999;30:67–82.

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  30. Versey HS. Centering perspectives on Black women, hair politics, and physical activity. Am J Public Health. 2014;104:810–5.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  31. Walker SD. Perceptions of barriers that inhibit African American women and adolescent girls from participation in physical activity. Las Vegas, US: Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), University of Nevada; 2012.

    Google Scholar 

  32. Barnes AS, Goodrick GK, Pavlik V, Markesino J, Laws DY, Taylor WC. Weight loss maintenance in African-American women: focus group results and questionnaire development. J Gen Intern Med. 2007;22:915–22.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  33. Hales CM, Carroll MD, Fryar CD, Ogden CL. Prevalence of obesity among adults and youth: United States, 2015–2016. NCHS data brief no. 288. Hyattesville, MD: National Center for Health Statistics; 2017.

  34. Ogden CL, Carroll MD, Lawman HG, Fryar CD, Kruszon-Moran D, Kit BK, et al. Trends in obesity prevalence among children and adolescents in the United States, 1988–94 through 2013–4. JAMA. 2016;315:2292–9.

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  35. Taylor KW, Baird DD, Herring AH, Engel LS, Nichols HB, Sandler DP, et al. Associations among personal care product use patterns and exogenous hormone use in the NIEHS Sister Study. J Expo Sci Environ Epidemiol. 2017;27:458–64.

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  36. Taylor KW, Troester MA, Herring AH, Engel LS, Nichols HB, Sandler DP, et al. Associations between personal care product use patterns and breast cancer risk among White and Black women in the sister study. Environ Health Perspect. 2018;126:027011.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  37. James-Todd T, Stahlhut R, Meeker JD, Powell SG, Hauser R, Huang T, et al. Urinary phthalate metabolite concentrations and diabetes among women in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) 2001–8. Environ Health Perspect. 2012;120:1307–13.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  38. Baird DD, Harmon QE, Upson K, Moore KR, Barker-Cummings C, Baker S, et al. A prospective, ultrasound-based study to evaluate risk factors for uterine fibroid incidence and growth: methods and results of recruitment. J Womens Health. 2015;24:907–15.

    Google Scholar 

  39. Goodman LA. Exploratory latent structure-analysis using both identifiable and unidentifiable models. Biometrika. 1974;61:215–31.

    Google Scholar 

  40. Enders CK, Bandalos DL. The relative performance of full information maximum likelihood estimation for missing data in structural equation models. Struct Equ Modeling. 2001;8:430–57.

    Google Scholar 

  41. Lanza ST, Collins LM, Lemmon DR, Schafer JL, PROC LCA, SAS A. Procedure for latent class analysis. Struct Equ Modeling. 2007;14:671–94.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  42. Nasserinejad K, van Rosmalen J, de Kort W, Lesaffre E. Comparison of criteria for choosing the number of classes in Bayesian finite mixture models. PLoS One. 2017;12:e0168838.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  43. Oberski D. Mixture models: latent profile and latent class analysis. In: Robertson J, Kaptein M, editors. Modern Statistical Methods for HCI. Cham: Springer International Publishing; 2016, p. 275–87. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-26633-6_12.

    Google Scholar 

  44. Goodman LA. On the assignment of individuals to latent classes. Socio Methodol. 2007;37:1–22.

    Google Scholar 

  45. Teteh DK, Montgomery SB, Monice S, Stiel L, Clark PY, Mitchell E. My crown and glory: Community, identity, culture, and Black women’s concerns of hair product-related breast cancer risk. Cogent Art Humanities. 2017;4:17.

    Google Scholar 

  46. Rosenberg L, Wise LA, Palmer JR. Hair-relaxer use and risk of preterm birth among African-American women. Ethn Dis. 2005;15:768–72.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  47. Blackmore-Prince C, Harlow SD, Gargiullo P, Lee MA, Savitz DA. Chemical hair treatments and adverse pregnancy outcome among Black women in central North Carolina. Am J Epidemiol. 1999;149:712–6.

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  48. Omosigho UR. Changing practices of hair relaxer use among black women in the United States. Int J Dermatol. 2018;57:e4–e5.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  49. James-Todd TM, Chiu Y-H, Zota AR. Racial/ethnic disparities in environmental endocrine disrupting chemicals and women’s reproductive health outcomes: epidemiological examples across the life course. Curr Epidemiol Rep. 2016;3:161–80.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  50. James-Todd TM, Meeker JD, Huang T, Hauser R, Seely EW, Ferguson KK, et al. Racial and ethnic variations in phthalate metabolite concentration changes across full-term pregnancies. J Expo Sci Environ Epidemiol. 2017;27:160–6.

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  51. Ruiz D, Becerra M, Jagai JS, Ard K, Sargis RM. Disparities in environmental exposures to endocrine-disrupting chemicals and diabetes risk in vulnerable populations. Diabetes Care. 2018;41:193–205.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  52. Jackson JS, Knight KM, Rafferty JA. Race and unhealthy behaviors: chronic stress, the HPA axis, and physical and mental health disparities over the life course. Am J Public Health. 2010;100:933–9.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  53. Jackson JW, Williams DR, VanderWeele TJ. Disparities at the intersection of marginalized groups. Soc psychiatry Psychiatr Epidemiol. 2016;51:1349–59.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  54. Williams DR, Collins C. Racial residential segregation: a fundamental cause of racial disparities in health. Public Health Rep. 2001;116:404–16.

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  55. Williams DR, Mohammed SA, Leavell J. Collins C Race, socioeconomic status, and health: complexities, ongoing challenges, and research opportunities. Ann New Y Acad Sci. 2010;1186:69–101.

    Google Scholar 

  56. Bray BC, Lanza ST, Tan X. Eliminating bias in classify-analyze approaches for latent class analysis. Struct Equ Modeling. 2015;22:1–11.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  57. Jenkins F, Jenkins C, Gregoski MJ, Magwood GS. Interventions promoting physical activity in African American women: an integrative review. J Cardiovasc Nurs. 2017;32:22–9.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

The authors wish to thank the Study of Environment, Lifestyle, and Fibroids participants and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences library staff, Stacy Mantooth and Erin Knight, for assistance with the literature search.

Funding

This research was supported by the Intramural Research Program of the NIH, National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (Z1AES103325-01 [CLJ] and 1ZIAES049013-23 [DB]).

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Epidemiology Branch, National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services, Research Triangle Park, NC, USA

    Symielle A. Gaston, Quaker Harmon, Donna Baird & Chandra L. Jackson

  2. Department of Environmental Health, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA, USA

    Tamarra James-Todd

  3. Department of Epidemiology, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA, USA

    Tamarra James-Todd

  4. National Toxicology Program, National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services, Research Triangle Park, NC, USA

    Kyla W. Taylor

  5. Intramural Program, National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services, Bethesda, MD, USA

    Chandra L. Jackson

Authors
  1. Symielle A. Gaston
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Tamarra James-Todd
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Quaker Harmon
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Kyla W. Taylor
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  5. Donna Baird
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  6. Chandra L. Jackson
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Contributions

Study concept and design: SAG, QH, DB, and CLJ. Acquisition of data: DB. Statistical analysis: SAG. Interpretation of data: SAG, TJ-T, QH, KWT, DB, and CLJ. Drafting of the paper: SAG. Critical revision of the paper for important intellectual content: SAG, TJ-T, QH, KWT, DB, and CLJ. Administrative, technical, and material support: QH, DB, and CLJ. Obtaining funding and study supervision: DB and CLJ. Final approval: SAG, TJ-T, QH, KWT, DB, and CLJ.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Chandra L. Jackson.

Additional information

Publisher’s note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Supplementary information

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Gaston, S.A., James-Todd, T., Harmon, Q. et al. Chemical/straightening and other hair product usage during childhood, adolescence, and adulthood among African-American women: potential implications for health. J Expo Sci Environ Epidemiol 30, 86–96 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41370-019-0186-6

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Revised:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41370-019-0186-6

Keywords

  • Hair preparations
  • Cosmetics
  • African Americans
  • Child
  • Women
  • Latent class analysis

This article is cited by

Search

Advanced search

Quick links