I had a bunch of ideas that I wanted to blog about this week. Guess which one I picked? The one that had the word 'evolution' in the title!! teehee. I just love thinking about the evolutionary origins of all the things that we take for granted...like, acne!
So, here's the question: what's the evolutionary explanation for acne? What, if any, selective advantage did acne (or something that causes acne) bestow to its possessors?
I've compiled a short list of possibilities that I'd like for you to help me expand.
The Sexual Repellent Hypothesis: some have said, although I'm skeptical, that acne keeps you gross enough during puberty that others will wait to mate with you until you're old enough adequately deal with the child. I can see a couple of problems with this. First, acne happens more frequently in males, since a large trigger is testosterone which increases the sebum production (pore blocker and lubricant).
Males, evolutionarily, although they can have selective advantage in investing in offspring have little selective disadvantage in not trying to produce offspring. So, our explanation of acne has to address the male problem and this one doesn't seem to adequately.
"It's Because I'm White, Isn't It?" Explanation: Whites have more acne than non-whites. So, how come? Well, I've thought about this for a bit since a close friend of mine suffers from Rosacea (a reddening condition of usually the face). Whites are white to absorb solar radiation to synthesis stuff like Vitamin D. We feed off the sun. The farther north one gets and the more clothing you wear means the whiter we need to get to make enough Vitamin D. There's another strategy evolution can use, though - don't just make the skin whiter, fill it with more blood. Is it possible that whites get more acne because our facial skin is flusher because it's trying to get enough blood to the surface to make Vitamin D? Maybe. It's a thought.
Dirt Don't Hurt Hypothesis: maybe we wash our face too much. I don't know this to be true and I don't want to be the one to test it either, but it's a worthwhile thought. We didn't regularly bath for most of our evolutionary history and maybe constantly removing the surface oil from our face (which is desperately trying to keep the face supple and emolliented to stay young looking) causes the production to go haywire. Maybe.
The Lucky Loser Hypothesis: some evolutionary biologists have proposed that maybe we go pizza face because it
prevents us from getting murdered. The argument simplistically goes like this, if you look good, you're a threat to other males' harems and therefore you get killed. On the other hand, if your face looks like the surface of the moon then you probably aren't a threat for their mate to cheat on with. Or, so they think! This argument receives anecdotal support by a good number of monkey species that have beta and omega males producing more offspring than alpha males. Zits are the perfect cover to sneak a mate with or to survive until your fully grown.
You Eat Yourself Pimpley Hypothesis: this argument says that it isn't an adaptation at all, it's a side effect of the fact that our diet has changed so drastically, so recently in our evolutionary history. What are the two most recent additions to our diet? Agriculture (by which I really mean grains) and dairy.
Both of which have been linked to increased levels of acne. The study in the linked article talks about tribal Canadians and Japanese that broke out after being introduced to dairy. It also talks about aboriginal people from Paraguay and Papua New Guinea that ate hardly any complex carbs and likewise had no occurrences of acne. Now, I should say diet and acne is a highly debated subject, but one I think we should listen to.
