Wearing braces to align crooked teeth is an automatic thing in today’s cosmetic era. People put their children through the procedure to wear braces as a routine without giving any thought whatsoever.
We assume that people will tease our kids for having crooked teeth, which may affect their self-confidence. But in reality it’s not so. Research has confirmed that not wearing braces does not make life any less happy.
Looking right and good has become so important that we have moved beyond aligning teeth. After teeth are aligned, people are seeking help of cosmetic and dental professionals to get their smiles repaired! There are procedures to fix smiles also. What life has come to!
Coming back to braces, people will find it very hard to believe that fixing braces to align teeth has no impact on a person’s mental and emotional well being or psychological health any time in future. People are not likely to suffer traumas because of crooked teeth in professional or personal life.
The researchers in UK conducted a study for around 20 years suggests that fixing braces to repair crooked teeth do not improve mental well being or quality of life of a person at any stage in future.
It’s nothing more than a widespread belief that people with crooked teeth are low on self-esteem or that it will affect them adversely in future.
A study was conducted on 1000 school children. It went on from 1981 till 2001. While some of these students had gone through the procedure to fix braces to straighten the crooked teeth, some decided to do nothing about their crooked teeth.
The children who wore braces got well-aligned teeth and were happy with the results. But the children or students who did not get braces fixed and continued to live with crooked teeth were not less happy because of it.
Thus the researchers observed in their report that braces had absolutely no positive impact on future psychological health of the individual.
According to the study published in British Journal of Health Psychology, the widespread belief among the dental professionals that orthodontics (braces) impacted self-esteem and psychology of an individual positively lacked any evidence to verify or confirm the same.
Another study also observed that if crooked teeth were not straightened it did not lead to any medical dental complication later. Crooked teeth are perfectly healthy and normal as long as they are taken care of, in terms of, brushing and flossing.
Before a child starts with the treatment or dental procedure there should be a sensible discussion whether there’s going to be any real benefit from the ordeal.
At the same time we should accept the fact that times have changed; attitudes & definition of beauty has also gone through a change. But from psychological and emotional well being point of view, let’s stick to the fact that braces do not impact them in any way.
