Nail biting is a common habit, but usually not a serious one for most children. Most children who bite their nails eventually lose the habit, but some may continue well into adulthood. In more serious situations, nail biting can lead to health concerns.
Nail biting is unsightly and can lead to skin damage, infections, and other health risks. It is a common habit during childhood, and although it can be frustrating for parents, it's often harmless, and kids usually outgrow it over time.
Your child may bite her nails for many reasons -- out of curiosity or boredom, to relieve stress, to pass the time, or from force of habit. Nail biting is the most common of the so-called "nervous habits," which include thumb sucking, nose picking, hair twisting or tugging, and tooth grinding.
The stereotypic behavior of nail biting might be a type of tactile hyposensitivity. Tactile information or experiences are relayed to the brain from the skin. Under-responsiveness or low registration to tactile information is a type of reaction impairment to sensory input.
Nail biting explained
Anxiety: Nail biting can be a sign of anxiety or stress. The repetitive behavior seems to help some people cope with challenging emotions. Boredom: Behaviors such as nail biting and hair twirling are more common when you're bored, hungry, or need to keep your hands busy.
Biting is a frustrating problem, but it's usually a temporary one, as many toddlers outgrow this habit by the age of three or four. Therefore, a persistent habit of biting beyond this age could be a sign of another issue, perhaps problems at school or behavioral issues.
Alternatively, you can also cover your nails with tape or stickers or wear gloves to prevent biting. Replace the nail-biting habit with a good habit. When you feel like biting your nails, try playing with a stress ball or silly putty instead. This will help keep your hands busy and away from your mouth.
Some of the reasons children bite their nails includes stress or anxiety, they are bored, they've seen other children do it and copy their behaviors, or their nails are not kept trimmed and they do it as a form of self-trimming. Most children that bite their nails have no problems.
Therefore, nail biting is a possible indication of the presence of the more severe ADHD-C subtype. Our results imply that a nail biting habit among these ADHD children is more related to insufficient parenting skills, rather than being part of general anxiety symptoms.
While most people assume nail biting has to do with nerves or anxiety, one study is linking this bad habit to a surprising personality trait. According to a study published in the March 2015 issue of Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry, nail biters are more likely to be perfectionists.
Therapy, especially CBT or ACT, can help someone identify and manage the repetitive thoughts or emotional triggers that drive nail-biting.
If you're nervous because of current events, or life in general, it's easy to fall into bad habits like nail biting, which may increases your chances of getting sick. You can curb your reliance on these activities by playing with a fidget spinner or other hand-held toy instead.
But they do know that it's a habit for a lot of us: about 20 to 30 percent of the population are nail biters, including up to 45 percent of teenagers.
Your child may bite his nails for any number of reasons – curiosity, boredom, stress relief, habit, or imitation. Nail-biting is the most common of the so-called "nervous habits," which include thumb-sucking, nose picking, hair twisting or tugging, and teeth grinding.
Similarly, biting your nails might increase the rate of nail growth. While it's not clear exactly how this occurs, researchers theorize that the physical manipulation of a nail through biting stimulates the growth plate of each finger to be more metabolically active, leading to speedier nail formation.
Additionally, if you swallow the nails, they can do damage to the epithelial lining of your esophagus and stomach. They will not digest, so if they're sharp, they will make their way through your entire body potentially scratching up your digestive tract.
While common nail-biting is a socially recognized “nervous habit”, compulsive nail-biting can be injurious and interfere with everyday functioning. While these BFRBs may look similar to behaviors one might see with Tourette's, they are not tic behaviors.
Find alternatives to keep your child's hands and mouth busy
Giving your child a substitute activity for their busy hands can relieve stress when they know they're nail-biting. Another idea for some children is chewing sugar-free gum, which can decrease their need to chew on their nails.
A: Doctors classify chronic nail biting as a type of obsessive-compulsive disorder since the person has difficulty stopping. People often want to stop and make multiple attempts to quit without success. People with onychophagia cannot stop the behavior on their own, so it's not effective to tell a loved one to stop.
“Stimming” refers to self-stimulating behavior, which are repetitive physical or verbal tics common in individuals with autism. To some degree, we all exhibit stimming behaviors. Nail biting, twirling your hair, drumming your fingers on the table, or cracking your knuckles are all forms of stimming.
Onychophagia is defined as a chronic nail biting. This condition should be distinguished from onychotillomania, another form of self-induced destruction of the nails similar to onychophagia caused by recurrent picking and manicuring of the nails.
Emotional or psychological problems
Nail biting can be associated with mental health conditions, such as: attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) major depressive disorder (MDD) obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD)