Research recently undertaken at the University of North Edmonton in Canada has been published to some controversy in a doctoral thesis entitled Causative Social Metaphors of Male Shaving Habits. The thesis exposes and analyses what it terms ‘shaving behavioural patterns”, formulated from about 700 observations over three years and that, the thesis, holds, have given new insight into the sometimes subordinate personalities, even suppressed criminal psycho-complexions and sexual incentives of the subjects observed.
By means of hidden cameras, direct observation, one-way mirrors and other methods, 700 ‘subject shaver” males were recorded having their daily scrapes. The subjects were at all times unaware that their shaving techniques and habits were being monitored. A team of six students, three senior supervisory tutors and two professors took part in the observations. In subsequent analysis and academic inquiry all are credited as participating authors.
The results of the psychological analyses of the different way men shave are fascinating. Oddly, the actions of the so-called ‘non-shaving” hand reveal the most about the individual. For example: the positions and assistance during shaving offered by the non-shaving hand can indicate deeply repressed psychological fixations. Some men will let the razor come uncomfortably close to the non-shaving hand, often letting the blade surface actually rub against its fingers before it is withdrawn to a safer distance. Dr Neel Winslow-Kennengton — the senior analytical psychologist in supervisory charge of the thesis — holds that such close encounters between razor-head and non-shaving hand are indicative of a mature ‘risk-enabling psycho profile” in the shaver and that quite possibly would place such a shaver in a higher than normal marital infidelity category.
Follow-up research done by private investigators commissioned by the university showed that in 76% of non-shaving hand riskers, the subject had indeed indulged in or were in the process of conducting extramarital sexual relationships.
Sexual incentives revealed by the way a man shaves are high on the list. Here the non-shaving hand again plays a major role. The thesis finds that the habit of grasping the nose and pulling it quite violently to one side while the razor shaves the inner panel of the cheek is highly indicative of ‘residual adolescent masturbatory instincts”. Men who pull and distort other parts of their faces, like lifting out of the way of ear lobes, while shaving also reveal subliminal facets of their sexual groundwork.
The pulling down of the upper lip — without use of the non-shaving hand — so that the upper teeth are covered and so that the moustache component of the beard may be scraped at is, according to Winslow-Kennengton, a sure sign of the need for oral sexual gratification.
‘The greater proportion of men in North American Protestant communities only hear or read about oral sex; seldom do any of these men have the chance to experience oral sex and, if they do, it is seldom in the domestic environment. Hence the extraordinary popularity of jokes about oral sex which abound in all-male gatherings in these communities. This is a clear example of the well-known ‘affective supplantation syndrome’ described by Jules Heinard.” (Exigencies of Release, Harvard Press, 1983)
Suppressed and/or deviated homosexual proclivities are dealt with in about 146 pages of the 260-page thesis. The conclusions drawn by the researchers make this area particularly seductive. Did you know, for example, that the gentle tactile exploration of the newly shaven face is a sure indication of ‘narcissistic homoeroticism”?
When this massage and tender facial touching is associated with careful examination of the face in the mirror, this conjecture is confirmed. Sado-masochistic homosexual predilection was revealed on the immediate instinctive reaction in many of the subjects to the sudden slipped razor and the resulting cut in the skin.
In cases where the cut was within reach, the tongue immediately flicked out to lick clean the little wound, often followed by a grimace of disgust as it encountered the taste of the shaving cream.
Other non-sexual or psychological findings emerge from the thesis. The fact that males tend to develop drooping facial wattles later in life than women is attributed to the fact that the male face in shaving is subjected to a ‘daily dozen” in which the skin is pushed and pulled, rubbed and massaged, thus increasing blood supply and keeping facial connective tissue in better shape than in females. The shaving also removes a fine outer layer of skin and that brings about similar vascular elaboration.
Causative Social Metaphors of Male Shaving Habits is to be published in book form this year under the title Through The Shaving Mirror