Personal grooming is the art of cleaning, grooming, and maintaining parts of the body. It is a species-typical behavior

Species-typical behavior

Species-typical behavior or "species-specific behavior" is a concept in ethology. It refers to behavior that is commonly engaged in by members of a species. Fixed action patterns are a type of species-typical behavior....

 that is controlled by neural circuits

Biological neural network

In neuroscience, a biological neural network describes a population of physically interconnected neurons or a group of disparate neurons whose inputs or signalling targets define a recognizable circuit. Communication between neurons often involves an electrochemical process...

 in the brain

Brain

The brain is the center of the nervous system in all vertebrate and most invertebrate animals—only a few primitive invertebrates such as sponges, jellyfish, sea squirts and starfishes do not have one. It is located in the head, usually close to primary sensory apparatus such as vision, hearing,...

.

In humans

Grooming in human

Human

Humans are the only living species in the Homo genus...

s typically includes bathroom

Bathroom

A bathroom is a room for bathing in containing a bathtub and/or a shower and optionally a toilet, a sink/hand basin/wash basin and possibly also a bidet....

 activities such as primping: washing and cleaning the hair

Hair

Hair is a filamentous biomaterial, that grows from follicles found in the dermis. Found exclusively in mammals, hair is one of the defining characteristics of the mammalian class....

, comb

Comb

A comb is a toothed device used in hair care for straightening and cleaning hair or other fibres. Combs are among the oldest tools found by archaeologists...

ing it to extract tangles, and styling. It can also include cosmetic care of the body and removal of the pubic and axillary hair for women and shaving of the beard for men. Another suitable alternative to shaving is beard grooming. Growing and maintaining requires less effort than being shaven.

In animals

Individual animal

Animal

Animals are a major group of multicellular, eukaryotic organisms of the kingdom Animalia or Metazoa. Their body plan eventually becomes fixed as they develop, although some undergo a process of metamorphosis later on in their life. Most animals are motile, meaning they can move spontaneously and...

s regularly clean themselves and put their fur, feathers or other skin

Skin

-Dermis:The dermis is the layer of skin beneath the epidermis that consists of connective tissue and cushions the body from stress and strain. The dermis is tightly connected to the epidermis by a basement membrane. It also harbors many Mechanoreceptors that provide the sense of touch and heat...

 coverings in good order. This activity is known as personal grooming, a form of hygiene

Hygiene

Hygiene refers to the set of practices perceived by a community to be associated with the preservation of health and healthy living. While in modern medical sciences there is a set of standards of hygiene recommended for different situations, what is considered hygienic or not can vary between...

. Extracting foreign objects

Foreign body

A foreign body is any object originating outside the body. In machinery, it can mean any unwanted intruding object.Most references to foreign bodies involve propulsion through natural orifices into hollow organs....

 such as insect

Insect

Insects are a class of living creatures within the arthropods that have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body , three pairs of jointed legs, compound eyes, and two antennae...

s, leaves, dirt

Soil

Soil is a natural body consisting of layers of mineral constituents of variable thicknesses, which differ from the parent materials in their morphological, physical, chemical, and mineralogical characteristics...

, twigs and parasites , are all forms of grooming. Among animals, bird

Bird

Birds are feathered, winged, bipedal, endothermic , egg-laying, vertebrate animals. Around 10,000 living species and 188 families makes them the most speciose class of tetrapod vertebrates. They inhabit ecosystems across the globe, from the Arctic to the Antarctic. Extant birds range in size from...

s spend considerable time preening their feather

Feather

Feathers are one of the epidermal growths that form the distinctive outer covering, or plumage, on birds and some non-avian theropod dinosaurs. They are considered the most complex integumentary structures found in vertebrates, and indeed a premier example of a complex evolutionary novelty. They...

s. This is done to remove ectoparasites, keep them in good aerodynamic condition, and waterproof them. To do that, they use the preen oil secreted by the uropygial gland

Uropygial gland

The uropygial gland, informally known as the preen gland, is a gland found in the large majority of birds that secretes an oil that birds use for preening. The chief compounds of preen oil are diester waxes called uropygiols....

, the dust of down feathers, or other means such as dust-bathing or anting

Anting (bird activity)

In the behavior called anting, birds rub insects on their feathers, usually ants, which secrete liquids containing chemicals such as formic acid, that can act as an insecticide, miticide, fungicide, bactericide, or to make them edible by removing the distasteful acid. It possibly also supplements...

. During oil spill

Oil spill

An oil spill is the release of a liquid petroleum hydrocarbon into the environment, especially marine areas, due to human activity, and is a form of pollution. The term is mostly used to describe marine oil spills, where oil is released into the ocean or coastal waters...

s, animal conservationists that rescue penguin

Penguin

Penguins are a group of aquatic, flightless birds living almost exclusively in the southern hemisphere, especially in Antarctica. Highly adapted for life in the water, penguins have countershaded dark and white plumage, and their wings have become flippers...

s sometimes dress them in knitted sweater

Penguin sweater

Penguin sweaters, also known as penguin jumpers, are sweaters which are knitted for penguins that have been caught in oil slicks. When an oil spill affects penguins, they are dressed in knitted sweaters to stop them preening their feathers and to keep them warm, since the spilled oil destroys their...

s to stop them from preening and thereby ingesting the mineral oil

Mineral oil

A mineral oil is any of various colorless, odorless, light mixtures of alkanes in the C15 to C40 range from a non-vegetable source, particularly a distillate of petroleum....

 which is poisonous. Felidae cats

Felidae

Felidae is the biological family of the cats; a member of this family is called a felid. Felids are the strictest carnivores of the thirteen terrestrial families in the order Carnivora, although the three families of marine mammals comprising the superfamily pinnipedia are as carnivorous as the...

 are well known for their extensive grooming. One reason advanced for such grooming is to remove all traces of blood and other matter so as to not alert prey with the scent. Cats groom so much that they often produce hairball

Hairball

A hairball is a small collection of hair or fur formed in the stomach of animals that is occasionally vomited up when it becomes too big. Hairballs are primarily a tight elongated cylinder of packed fur, but may include bits of other elements such as swallowed food. Cats are especially prone to...

s from the fur they ingest.

Grooming as a social activity

Many social animal

Social animal

A social animal is a loosely defined term for an organism that is highly interactive with other members of its species to the point of having a recognizable and distinct society.All mammals are social to the extent that mothers and offspring bond...

s adapt preening and grooming behaviors for other social purposes such as bonding and social structure

Social structure

Social structure is a term used in the social sciences to refer to patterned social arrangements in society that are both emergent from and determinant of the actions of the individuals. The usage of the term "social structure" has changed over time and may reflect the various levels of analysis...

 enforcement.

Mutual Grooming in Human Relationships

In human kind, mutual grooming is quite related to social grooming

Social grooming

In social animals, including humans, social grooming or allogrooming is an activity in which individuals in a group clean or maintain one another's body or appearance. It is a major social activity, and a means by which animals who live in proximity can bond and reinforce social structures, family...

, which is defined as the process by which human beings fulfill one of their basic instincts, such as socializing, cooperating and learning from each other.
Research conducted by Holly Nelson (from the University of New Hampshire

University of New Hampshire

The University of New Hampshire is a public university in the University System of New Hampshire , United States. The main campus is in Durham, New Hampshire. An additional campus is located in Manchester. With over 15,000 students, UNH is the largest university in New Hampshire. The university is...

) and Glenn Geher (State University of New York

State University of New York

The State University of New York, abbreviated SUNY , is a system of public institutions of higher education in New York, United States. It is the largest comprehensive system of universities, colleges, and community colleges in the United States, with a total enrollment of 465,000 students, plus...

 at Platz), individuals who chose their romantic partner reported more mutual grooming than others who focused in other types of relationships. Hence, this study hypothesized that mutual grooming was related to relationship satisfaction, trust and previous experience of affection within the family. They claim that even though humans do not groom each other with the same fervor that other species do, they are groomers par excellence. Therefore, human mutual grooming plays an important role in pair bond

Pair bond

In biology, a pair bond is the strong affinity that develops in some species between the males and females in a pair, potentially leading to breeding. Pair-bonding is a term coined in the 1940s that is frequently used in sociobiology and evolutionary psychology circles...

ing.
In the same investigation, researchers found that individuals with more promiscuous attitudes and those who scored high on the anxiety sub-scale on an adult attachment style measure, tend to groom their partners more frequently. These findings were also consistent with some of the functions of grooming: potential parental indicator, developing trust and courtship or flirtation.

See also

• Acral lick dermatitis
• Preen gland
• Wound licking
  Wound licking
  Wound licking is an instinctive response in humans and many other animals to an injury. Dogs, cats, rodents and primates all lick wounds. The enzyme, lysozyme which is found in many tissues is what is the aid for the wounds. The reason for aid in healing is, lysozyme attacks the cell walls of...