Maybe it speaks to the inherent vanity in guys, but there is not a single topic that is surrounded by more widely accepted, false “conventional wisdom” than the topic of hair loss. Baldness is genetically inherited from your mother’s family? Wrong. The gene responsible for thinning hair can come from either parent.
A shiny pate is the result of too much testosterone? Nope. Rather, it’s dihydrotestosterone (a completely different hormone) that’s the likely culprit, though that remains unproven. Continued use of hair gel can leave you with nothing to gel? Another myth.
Perhaps the biggest and most persistent myth, however, seems to be the relationship between male baldness and our ball caps that we love so much. Every guy has at least one well-weathered cap, discolored with years of sweat and dirt that is still our favorite. We can’t bring ourselves to throw it out, but we eye them suspiciously when we find a few stray hairs in the sink. After all, we’ve heard time and again how caps – worn all the time, especially in the summer heat – leads to balding.
The fact is, they have little do with your hair loss.
It’s tough to nail down the origin of this falsity. Some versions of the tale relate baldness to caps starving hair follicles of the oxygen they need. Others tie it to the sweat stains and other dirt that give our favorite hats that character.
In the first instance, while it’s true that follicles need oxygen to thrive it’s false that wearing a hat cuts off that oxygen from getting where it needs to go. Follicles feed on oxygen internally, not externally. They get their oxygen from your bloodstream, not the atmosphere. The only way a ball cap can starve follicles of oxygen is if you’re wearing it unusually tight “” like “cutting off the circulation to your scalp” tight. You’d likely feel other effects, like a splitting headache, before there would be any damage to your hair.
Now, the second basis for caps causing baldness has some truth to it. Unwashed and unusually filthy hats may hold some dirt and sweat which could result in infection on the scalp and lead to hair loss, but doctors point out, while possible, it’s extremely rare.
The one possible tie from your headwear to hair loss is also in the “possible but unlikely” category. Traction alopecia, in which there is constant traction against hair, can lead to thinning locks, according to the experts. The affliction is more likely to come from cornrows or other hairstyles that create that tension, or headwear prevalent in other cultures such as turbans, than your trusty 7-3/4″ Cincinnati Reds cap.
So why is it so noticeable that under many caps there’s a receding hairline and bald spot? It’s probably a case of “post hoc ergo propter hoc” – the logical fallacy “with this, so because of this,” experts say. That baseball cap worn by men isn’t causing hair loss, but rather hiding their hair loss.
