Biting your fingernails: causes and how to stop

Biting your fingernails: causes and how to stop
Photo: CC0 / Pixabay / derneuemann

Biting your fingernails is a common habit. Here you can find out whether nibbling is dangerous, why you bite your nails in the first place and how you can stop it.

Biting your fingernails, also called onychophagia, is a common habit that is not automatically a sign of a neurotic or mental illness. Nevertheless, suffering can arise for those affected, for example if the habit is perceived as annoying, leads to problems with self-confidence or social insecurity or causes pain.

Children and young people in particular are keen fingernail chewers. Nearly half of all adolescents bite their nails, a study from the 1990s found. Unfortunately, there are no more recent studies on the exact frequency. According to the study, the phenomenon declines significantly with adulthood, with around one in ten still affected by nail biting, at least occasionally.

When biting their fingernails, those affected nibble their nails down to the sole of the nail. Sometimes they also bite the skin of the fingertips or the nail bed. Chewing can lead to bloody cuticles, tender fingertips and therefore pain. The open, sensitive areas can also lead to inflammation.

Even if there are no medical consequences, sufferers may perceive the bitten nails as a cosmetic defect, which may create an additional desire to combat the habit. But what approaches are there?

Causes: Why we bite our fingernails

Young people are particularly affected by fingernail biting.
Young people are particularly affected by fingernail biting.
(Photo: CC0 / Pixabay / Myriams Photos)

Fingernail biting is particularly common among children and adolescents, but can also occur in adults. The causes can be very different and, depending on the person, point to different underlying problems, but in the vast majority of cases nail biting is just a habit. These are the most common reasons for nibbling:

  • Biting your fingernails can be an indication of unresolved conflicts or physical tension and serves as an outlet to release accumulated stress. Talk to your child about possible difficulties in their environment. If you are affected yourself, reflect on what problems you could suppress or reflect on what stressors you currently have in your life.
  • If you’ve been biting your nails since you were a teenager, it’s probably “just” an annoying habit by now.
  • If you’re nervous or tense, biting your nails can serve as a substitute for satisfaction. Boredom is also a factor.
  • Especially in children, biting their fingernails can indicate that they are not (or are not allowed to) express their emotions properly. The nibbling then serves as an outlet for strong feelings, such as aggression or fear.
  • For very active children, but also for teenagers and adults, nail biting can be a way to get rid of excess energy.

Biting your fingernails: tips for breaking the habit

Nibble carrots instead of chewing fingernails.
Nibble carrots instead of chewing fingernails.
(Photo: CC0 / Pixabay / klimkin)

One of the most common methods you can use to break the habit of biting your fingernails is so-called habit reversal training. Its goal is to break behavioral patterns and establish new habits. It is also called decoupling and, according to a 2010 study, is a successful method for reducing the impulse to bite your fingernails.

This is how the habit breaker works:

  1. Pay attention to the situations in which you bite your fingernails for a while and make notes. This can help you find the cause of your nail biting and get to the root of the problem. For example, if you notice that you primarily bite your nails when you have too much energy or boredom, you can take direct measures to prevent these conditions, such as exercise or distraction.
  2. Replace the urge to bite your nails with another impulse. For example, you can sit on your hands or interlace your fingers. It can also be helpful not to replace your impulse with a completely new action, but rather to redirect the movement at the last second, so to speak. For example: When you bring your hand to your mouth to bite your nails, grab your nose or ear instead, temporarily creating a new, harmless habit.

You can also do this to prevent nail biting

  • If stress is the trigger for the nibbling, learn methods for dealing with stress or relaxation techniques. You can easily reduce your tension level with autogenic training or progressive muscle relaxation (PME).
  • If you bite your nails because you are not working properly, then do sport or exercise in nature. On the one hand, this helps to get rid of excess energy. On the other hand, sport is a relaxation technique and clears your head.
  • If you bite your nails when you are tense, you can also use chewy vegetables to compensate. Carrots or kohlrabi are particularly good. You can see which vegetables are currently in season in our seasonal calendar.
  • Daily nail care or manicures can also save you from nibbling by immediately caring for and removing any protruding pieces of skin or torn nails.
  • A tried and tested method is a bitter tincture, a bitter nail polish. You brush this onto your nails regularly. The tincture tastes so inedible that you quickly stop chewing it. You can get them at the pharmacy. However, these do not treat the cause, only the symptom.
  • In very serious cases, you can also protect the affected areas with bandages or plasters.

However, if you notice that despite these various methods you are unable to stop biting your nails and you continue to suffer (physically or mentally) from the habit, it is advisable to consult a doctor and get advice.

Read more on Techzle\.com:

  • Cutting fingernails: 5 typical mistakes
  • White spots on your fingernails: what’s really behind them
  • Strengthen brittle fingernails with natural remedies

Edited by Freya Petersen

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