Bra or not to Bra

Dudess wrote: »

Age shouldn't make a jot of a difference, but at the same time, do you want to risk droopage due to lack of support?

Penny Dreadful wrote: »

Why? Loads of people seem to have the idea that wearing a bra is bad for your breasts and I'd love to know what the basis for this argument is?

No bra for 1 year
In 2003, a young sportswoman, Dr. Laetitia Pierrot, became interested in the question of knowing if there was any real interest in whether a woman should wear a bra or not for sports (1). For this purpose, she carried out a study of 33 volunteers who regularly participated in sport and who she asked to go without a bra for a whole year. The subjects were between 18 and 25 years, in good health, did not smoke and practised a sports activity for at least four hours per week. She separated those doing 'vertical' sports, for example gymnastics or foot racing, from 'horizontal' sports such as swimming. It is important to realise that these women stopped wearing a bra completely, not only for sport, but also in everyday life. The protocol included both biometric assessment and questionnaires at four time intervals during the study

Better formed breasts
At the time of the first evaluation which took place at 6 weeks from the start of the study, a majority of the women reported some discomfort; it is not easy to give up a practice that has been very much a part of ones everyday life. This discomfort had improved by six months, and had gone by the end of the study, with 88% of the women reporting that they felt more comfortable and had more freedom of movement. As for the biometric assessments, there was an improvement in the quality of the tissues and better muscular development in the rotator muscles of the shoulders and the pectoralis major. An added benefit was a major reduction in the stretch marks during the first six weeks. This was explained by the absence of compression by the bra of the skin and vascular pedicles and better venous and lymphatic drainage. Other measurements confirmed the advantages of not wearing a bra. After one year, for example, it was noted that there was a clear reduction in the distance from the nipple to the shoulder bones (acromion), lifting the breast. The other measurements were similarly improved, an increase in the distance from the nipple to the bottom of the breast, and the horizontal nipple angle. On the other hand, there was no significant difference between the two sporting activities (vertical and horizontal).

Conclusions
From all these biometric measurements, one can conclude that, contrary to popular opinion, the breasts do not sag if not supported. After an initial period of adaptation, the women who took part in this study did not have any complaints of discomfort while participating in sports and even gained a more positive aesthetic shape to their breasts. Something to think about.

Institute of Human Living Sciences, Otsuma Women's University, Tokyo, Japan.

Eleven adult female subjects aged 22-39 years wore a certain brassière for 3 months while anthropometry and moiré fringe photographs on the anterior trunk were taken regularly once a week. After the 3 months, the brassière was not worn for another 3 months. Then the measurements and photogrammetry were repeated for comparison using superimposed moiré configurations. The results are summarized as follows. Regardless of slim or obese trunk, subjects with pendent breasts showed the highest degree of breast form "correction" from wearing the brassière. In all subjects, after 3 months of brassière constraint, the underbust circumference was smaller but the chest circumference became enlarged, the distance between the right and left nipples became wider, and the breasts tended to hang down. This change was more marked in obese subjects with pendent breasts. And when this type of subject wore a "well-fitted" brassière for a long time, her breast form became developed; that is, her breasts hung down more.

Bras and breast cancer risk

Bra-wearing has been linked to breast cancer in a study done by Sidney Ross Singer and Soma Grismaijer. They found, for example, that women who wore a bra 24 hours a day had a 113-fold increase in breast cancer incidence compared to women who wore bra less than 12 hours daily! They suggest that bras exert enough pressure to the breast and surrounding areas to inhibit the flow of lymph, which then causes toxins and other waste material to remain in the breasts instead of being flushed out.

Now, this effect may be due to the fact that most women just wear the wrong size bra that is too tight somewhere. No one has done any studies investigating the link between breast cancer and how well the woman's bra fits. Either way, for your breast health's sake it is better to avoid wearing bras whenever possible, and for those occasions when you do need one, get well-fitting bras.

rubadub wrote: »

Bump this thread rather than start a new one
Actually it seems is quite the opposite.

iguana wrote: »

Neither of the tests about breast shape had enough women taking part or lasted long enough to give any sort of conclusion.

iguana wrote: »

The fact that the researchers drew conclusions from such inconclusive studies shows a very possible bias from the start.

Posy wrote: »

even with my teeny boobs, it'd hurt to go jogging or running so I'd have to wear a bra then!

Faith wrote: »

rubadub, this is OT I know, but why would it be safer to not wear a helmet when cycling?

In 1990, the Australian state of Victoria made safety helmets mandatory for all bicycle riders. While there was a reduction in the number of head injuries, there was also an unintended reduction in the number of juvenile cyclists – fewer cyclists obviously leads to fewer injuries, all else being equal. Research by Vulcan et al. found that the reduction in juvenile cyclists was because the youths considered wearing a bicycle helmet unfashionable.[23] A health benefit model developed at Macquarie University in Sydney suggests that, while helmet use reduces "the risk of head or brain injury by approximately two-thirds or more", the decrease in exercise caused by reduced cycling as a result of helmets laws is counterproductive in terms of net health.[

Father Mathew's temperance campaign in 19th-century Ireland – in which thousands of people vowed never to drink alcohol again – led to the consumption of ether, a much more dangerous intoxicant, by those unwilling to break their pledge.

Anthropology

According to some anthropologists, the lips are similar in appearance to the labia because they flush red and swell when they're aroused, a possible conscious or subconscious reason that women in many cultures make their lips even redder with lipstick

British zoologist and ethologist Desmond Morris theorizes that cleavage is a sexual signal that imitates the image of the cleft between the buttocks,[15] which according to Morris in The Naked Ape is also unique to humans, other primates as a rule having much flatter buttocks.

Evolutionary psychologists theorize that humans' permanently enlarged breasts, in contrast to other primates' breasts, which only enlarge during ovulation, allowed females to "solicit male attention and investment even when they are not really fertile",[16] though Morris notes that in recent years there has been a trend toward reversing breast augmentations