Chemical and physical damage affect the perceptions of hair attributes: A quantitative sensory assessment by a trained panel

Abstract

Hair damage is caused by several chemical and physical factors. Each kind of damage affects different parts of the hair structure (cuticle and cortex) and may be noticed differently by consumers. This work aimed to assess how trained panelists perceived several types of damage to different hair types. Therefore, we prepared wavy and tight curly tresses and submitted them to standardized chemical and physical damages. A trained panel performed sensory analyses of the damaged tresses compared to virgin hair. In the analysis, the panelists assessed eight different sensory attributes: glow, silkiness, smoothness, dryness, combability, volume, frizz, and balance. The results showed that damage from UV exposure most affected the sensory attributes of hair tresses. Hair treatments that promote fiber alignment (straightening and thermal damage) had “hidden” harmful effects and attributes were noticed as if hair had improved. Practical Application Consumer's hair suffers damage daily from many sources. Most previous studies have reported the results of instrumental assessments of these damages, without considering how they are perceived by people. The current study assessed how panelists noticed hair damage from different sources to better understand damage from the consumer's point of view.

Nanoscale friction of biomimetic hair surfaces

“…1 In particular, maintaining low friction between hairs is important for satisfactory sensory perception during touching, brushing and combing. 2–7 Consequently, the kinetic friction of hair has been studied using a wide range of experimental techniques from the macroscale to the nanoscale. 8–30 The friction between nanoscale tips and single hairs, 10–14,18,22,26 as well as crossed hair–hair contacts, 23–25 have been investigated using atomic force microscopy (AFM) and high-load nanotribometers.…”

Antioxidant extracts from Dicerocaryum senecioides as active ingredients in semi‐permanents and hair conditioners

“…The extract antioxidant alone has no capability to open hair cuticles scales of undamaged hair. A higher pH facilitated by use of ammonium buffer in the base activator (pH 8.5) is required to open cuticle scales for the extract antioxidant to reach the cortex where the curling chemistry took place [15]. Damaged hair has less scales and hence easy to be penetrated by active permanent waving chemicals.…”

“…The oxidation process with hydrogen peroxide often results in oxidative damage which leads to the formation of cysteic acid instead of the usual cystine. It also causes bleaching on hair, giving a brown‐reddish coloration thereby exposing hair to further damage by UV radiation [15]. The damage on hair after chemical treatment can be assessed using an attenuated total reflectance–Fourier transform infrared spectrophotometer (ATR‐FTIR) to detect the presence of characteristic cysteic acid peak at 1040–4 cm −1 [14].…”

Sensory evaluation in the personal care space: A review

“…Additionally, this group created a tool, the TPT, which includes both physical and emotional terms that can be used to describe tactile experiences with skincare products (Guest et al, 2011); though the emotional terms may lack relevance in descriptive analysis research, the learning from this study can help guide lexicon development. Aside from skincare products, related lexicons, and descriptive analysis methods exist for other personal care products such as lip products (Dooley et al, 2009), toothpaste (Hightower & Chambers, 2009; Kim, Sung, & Kim, 2013), cosmetic powders (Moussour et al, 2017), facial cleansing/makeup remover wipes (Xing et al, 2019), damaged hair (Bloch et al, 2020), and shampoos (ASTM International, 2020a). The development of more lexicons is needed to further support research on personal care products; one notably gap exists for washed‐off products such as facial cleansers or hand scrubs.…”