Researchers from Indiana University studied a total of 3,139 students (about evenly divided between males and females), who completed the online Campus Sexual Health Survey, to assess their habits of genital grooming. Over 97% of students had shaved or trimmed pubic hair at some point in their life, with an average starting age of 15.5 years. 88.1% of college women have done so within the last month, and 69.3% of men. The practice is especially common among fraternity or sorority members (91% in the past month) and those involved in casual dating or hooking up (86%), less common among black students (61.8%) and non-heterosexuals (60.5%), although it was a majority practice even in these groups. Researchers attribute the unpopularity of pubic hair to self-consciousness and anxiety that potential sexual partners perceive it as uncouth and unclean, perhaps influenced by the idealized body images seen in pornography, where actresses are bikini-waxed and buff male actors have no scrotal hair and minimal hair above their genitals. The authors recommend that campus health services should incorporate pubic hair removal education into sexual health and self-care discussions to promote safe, evidence-based practices.
Students Shedding Pubic Hair
