Claim: Most guys don’t bald naturally; masturbation makes them lose their hair.
Verdict: FALSE. There is no evidence that masturbation in men leads to hair loss or stops hair growth.
Context
Baldness in men is a common phenomenon but sometimes becomes a concern when it happens at a much younger age. In some cases, persons who experience hair loss have used medical intervention to redeem it.
A former English striker, Wayne Rooney, is an example of a person who has undergone a hair transplant. It was so important to him that, two years after the first transplant failed, he went for a second one at 27.
While the cause of Rooney’s baldness was known to be male pattern baldness and found to be hereditary, several other reasons exist for hair loss in men.
There is a claim that masturbation is the cause of baldness in men. The screenshot of a tweet asserts that masturbation is the reason most men go bald.
“Most guys ain’t bald naturally, masturbation made them bald, the more you masturbate, the more you lose hair, stop masturbating guys to keep your hairline intact,” the tweet reads.
Screenshot of the claim by @JAY6th/ⓒtwitter
The tweet got a combination of retweets, likes, comments, and views in 159 engagements by Thursday 3 March 2023 and was quoted by YabaLeftOnline (@yabaleftonline) in the screenshot below, saying, “We might need to have a conversation with Mbah,” referring to a well known Twitter influencer who is bald.
Screenshot of tweet from Yabaleftonline/ⓒtwitter
Similar claims were made here and here, with a combined engagement of over 400.
We also found comments as far back as 2012 linking baldness to masturbation.
Screenshots of past tweets on the same claim
Verification
Baldness, according to hopkinsmedicine.org, is a state of hair loss or absence of hair. It’s also called alopecia. Baldness is usually most noticeable on the scalp but can happen anywhere on the body where hair grows. The condition is more common in men than in women.
Masturbation, on the other hand, is an erotic stimulation, especially of one's genital organs, commonly resulting in orgasm and is achieved by manual or other bodily contacts exclusive of sexual intercourse, by instrumental manipulation, occasionally by sexual fantasies, or by various combinations of these agencies.
Looking at both definitions, it is difficult not to wonder where these two phenomena meet. In verifying this, DUBAWA dug into research and publications on the subject.
In the video here, Metromale Clinic, which has over 64,000 YouTube subscribers, published a video by a Sexologist, Karthik Gunasekaran, who says masturbation has nothing to do with hair loss.
According to Karthik, when a man masturbates, the only thing lost is semen, which has nothing whatsoever with hair loss. He states that the only thing that can cause hair loss is Testosterone, and this is not connected to masturbation.
This article published by HairMD in May 2021 revealed that no medical proof was found that masturbation or sexual activities cause hair loss. It further explained that DHT (DiHydroTestosterone), proven to cause baldness, is not produced during masturbation or sexual activity.
We also discovered a fact-check by The Cable in August 2022, which rated this claim false.
Expert Opinion
A medical doctor, Frederick Unuigbokhai, in an interview with DUBAWA, stated that there is no medically proven link between masturbation and baldness.
He explained that baldness happens in both men and women and that a high level of testosterone can lead to a heightened urge for sex and which could lead to masturbation but does not result in baldness.
Click here to learn the possible causes, symptoms, treatments, and other relevant baldness information.
Conclusion
Our findings show that there is no medical proof that masturbation causes baldness. The claim that it does is a myth.
