Michelle from lab muffin beauty science here and today we're going to be
talking about more skincare myths if you follow me at lab muffin beauty science
on instagram you know that I regularly bust beauty myths earlier I did a video
on five of the biggest skincare myths and today I'm going to be talking about
five more if you believe in some of these myths don't feel too bad
I definitely believed in all of these at some point the important thing is once
we find out that it's a myth we stop repeating it and we stop perpetuating it
the problem with myths is that they lead us to act in ways that we think are
beneficial but actually aren't they might do nothing or they might even be
actively harmful if you like watching this sort of video I'd really
appreciate it if you subscribed to my youtube channel you can also click the
notification bell so you don't miss any videos and click the like under this
video as well the first myth is that you should only use chemical exfoliants at
night this myth is about chemical exfoliants and in particular it's about
the alpha hydroxy acid exfoliant glycolic acid there were some studies
that found that using glycolic acid could make your skin photosensitive in
other words it was more sensitive to the Sun it was easier to get sunburned
I think this myth came because a lot of people saw the results of this study and
assumed that it was because the glycolic acid and the skin when sunlight was
shining on it it caused it to react in a way that it normally wouldn't sort of
like how citrus oils can do this but the structure of glycolic acid means that it
can't interact with the Sun very strongly and if you look at what
actually happened in the study it's pretty clear that this is a myth in the
study 10% glycolic acid and 2% salicylic acid was applied to volunteers' skin for
three and a half weeks then the next day after the three and a half weeks they
tested the skin with UV and they found that the area with 10% glycolic acid was
more sensitive so in the study there wasn't actually fresh glycolic acid on
the skin when it was tested with UV that means that it's more likely that the
glycolic acid caused the skin to change in a way that made it more susceptible to
UV damage so for example the cells are flatter and so light gets through more
easily or there might be less pigment an interesting part of the study is that
the area that was treated with salicylic acid didn't actually get more
photosensitive and in studies where salicylic acid was freshly applied on
the skin and then treated with UV they actually found that salicylic acid was
protective you can see that from the structure of salicylic acid it can
actually absorb UV salicylic acid also has anti-inflammatory properties which
could cool down sunburn what you should be doing instead just use chemical
exfoliants wherever they fit into your routine if you're using glycolic acid or
any other alpha hydroxy acids make sure you wear sunscreen as well you should be
wearing sunscreen anyway because it's really good for your skin if you want to
find out more about how to exfoliate then I have a free exfoliation guide
that you can download I've got the link in the description myth number two the
difference between physical and chemical sunscreens is that physical sunscreens
scatter and reflect UV light while chemical sunscreens absorb UV light and
convert it to heat I see this myth around a lot from dermatologists and
peer-reviewed articles and other sources that you would normally expect to be
quite reliable in reality the physical sunscreens which usually refers to zinc
oxide and titanium dioxide they only scatter and reflect about 5%
of the sun's UV the other 95% is absorbed and converted to heat
just like with chemical sunscreens this might seem like a nitpicky technical
detail that we shouldn't really worry too much about but the problem is it
does lead to people picking physical sunscreens for reasons that aren't
actually true for example some people think that this is the reason why
chemical sunscreens feel hotter on their face or that the heat produced by
chemical sunscreens can make melasma worse when in reality there's only
really a five percent difference so because of this myth some people turn to
physical sunscreens and then they run into the biggest drawbacks of these
which is the fact that they're really thick they tend to be quite
uncomfortable and they often give a white cast which is where when you apply
it on darker skin not even that dark so I see this on my skin and then to get
around these problems people apply less sunscreen which is definitely bad for
you you can find out more about how to pick and use
sunscreens in my ebook the lab muffin guide to basic skincare there is a free sample
chapter which includes lots of information on sunscreens I've also done
lots and lots of videos about sunscreens I've linked all of this again in the
description the next myth is that if a product contains comedogenic ingredients
it will break you out I've done a video before on the whole concept of
comedogenicity but in short the test for these don't reflect how products are
used in real life firstly the tests were done on rabbit ears which are not human
faces and there was one very important false positive very early on which was
petrolatum or petroleum jelly this clogged rabbit ears but later on they found out
that on human skin it doesn't clog pores at all newer tests use human skin but
they usually use back skin and they cover the ingredient with a patch which
is again not how we would use this product on our skin
the third big issue is that they usually use a hundred percent of an ingredient
in a product we have dilution ingredients will interact with each
other and your skin differently if they've been diluted for example if you
have pure butter versus butter in a cake it's a very different experience
so these comedogenicity ratings might point you in the right direction
if you're trying to work out which product is breaking you out especially
if it's a product that only has one ingredient or if it has a really
comedogenic ingredient as one of the top ingredients even then different people
will react differently to the same product instead what you should do is
keep track of products that have broken you out and see if you can work out
which ingredients are common between them definitely don't throw out products
that have worked for you just based on these ratings you should also add one
product at a time to your routine so that you can easily work out which
product is causing you to break out the next myth is that medical grade skincare
is better for your skin
so firstly to clarify medical-grade refers to products or brands that are
only sold in dermatology clinics or in aesthetics clinics they're also
sometimes called clinical products or professional-grade products this is very
different from prescription medications like tretinoin cream or over-the-counter
medications like benzoyl peroxide or sunscreen there are lots of myths about
why medical-grade skin care products are supposed to work better for example
there's a myth that they're regulated differently from regular cosmetics which
is not true so-called medical grade products like cleansers and moisturizers
are not regulated differently from normal brands that you would get in a
supermarket it is just a marketing term with no legal meaning there's also the
myth that they automatically contain higher quality ingredients that they're
rigorously tested that they have clinical studies to back them up again
this might be true for some brands but not necessarily just from the term
medical grade it really depends on what that specific brand wants to do with
their development process even though the term implies that there's all this
rigorous testing a brand can simply just slap the term medical grade on their
product and sell it only through particular clinics and without any of
this testing that would be perfectly fine there's also the fact that lots of
drugstore products are rigorously tested especially with the brands that are more
dermatological there's also this myth that medical grade products are allowed
to penetrate more deeply or contain higher concentrations of actives than so-called
over-the-counter or regular drugstore products and again it's not true they
aren't regulated differently instead what you should do is use skincare
products that work for your skin and your budget and your preferences if a
brand has studies to back up their products that's fantastic look at that
but don't just look at the word medical grade and expect that that will work
better the final myth is that oily skin doesn't require moisturizer
I've talked about this myth before in my video on dry and dehydrated skin oily
skin can produce lots of oil but that doesn't necessarily mean that it's good
at holding on to water so for example my skin the oil that sits on top of your
skin the sebum isn't actually that good at holding on to water or preventing
trans epidermal water loss moisturizers are designed to help your skin and
compensate for lack of oil or lack of water and there are three main types of
ingredients in these there are occlusives which sit on top of your skin and trap
water in there are emollients which help to soften your skin and there are
humectants which hold onto water and keep it on your skin not all of these
ingredients are oils often occlusives and emollients are oils but
humectants are not oily so if your skin is oily you shouldn't just avoid
moisturizers instead what you should do is check if your skin is dehydration
prone then pick a moisturizer that addresses that problem if you want a ton
of detail about picking moisturizers you can check out my video on dry and
dehydrated skin I also have a whole chapter in my ebook that's all about
picking moisturizers so did you believe any of these 5 myths I definitely did
are there other myths that you keep seeing pop up time and time again if so
leave them in the comments and I will bust them if you like myth-busting you
might want to follow me at lab muffin beauty science on Instagram where I bust
myths all the time you can of course subscribe to this YouTube channel and
check out my blog as well see you next time