Does chewing gum reduces face fat? Are you serious? But the problem is that this is not just a massively prevalent myth, but a lot of leading websites, magazines and news dailies are promoting these fallacies openly. The common question of people these days is how to reduce face fat. Surprisingly a website even quoted a doctor, who suggested chew gum the entire day to reduce facial fat.

Sometimes I think that if you tell people convincingly that running naked every day at midnight will double your fat burn, soon it would be amazing to be awake till midnight.

The answer is straight on the face, NO.

Chewing gum doesn’t do anything to your face fat.

Firstly, please understand that there is nothing called spot reduction, you simply cannot reduce fat from a particular area, period. Fat reduces from the entire body. You cannot have a thinner face, fat arms, washboard stomach, and weak legs; the body doesn’t allow such disproportionality to happen. Which areas are your problem areas, depends on your genetics.

Chewing gum will not do anything to facial fat. Does chewing gum reduces face fat? This is one of the most stupid myths. On the other hand, there are many side effects of chewing gum. If you eat excessive chewing gum, thinking that it will help you get that amazing jawline, then you may end up having a wider jawline. Yes, you heard me right. Excessive chewing of gum can lead to hypertrophy of the muscles of your jaw like masseter and temporalis muscles, and this would make your jaw wider.

Dr. Parish Sedghizadeh, associate professor at the University of California School of Dentistry, says that “You can work out your jaw, and this will definitely work out your jaw”. Your jaw muscles do not need any type of extra workout. They will work out enough when you perform your daily activities like talking and eating.

Excessive chewing of gums can lead to multiple jaw problems which can result in headaches, jaw clicking, and popping, and a possible injury to the temporomandibular joint (TMJ), a hinge that connects the jaw to the face.

A Nov 2013 study in the journal Paediatric Neurology, by a team of researchers led by Nathan Watemberg, recruited thirty patients (25 girls) with an average age of 16, who had been suffering from chronic headaches, and evaluated the influence of daily excessive gum chewing. These individuals were classified into four groups depending on the number of daily hours of gum-chewing.

• Group 1 – up to 1 hour of gum-chewing/day
• Group 2 – up to 1-3 hours of gum-chewing/day
• Group 3 – 3-6 hours of gum chewing/day
• Group 4 – more than 6 hours of gum chewing/day

All children discontinued chewing for 1 month, reintroduced the habit, and were re-interviewed after 2-4 weeks. Surprisingly, following gum-chewing discontinuation, 26 reported significant improvement in headaches, and all patients reinstituting the habit reported symptoms relapse within days. This simply means that excessive chewing of gum is a major contributor to headaches.

A Sep 2014 study in the Journal of Craniofacial Surgery, by a team of Iranian researchers led by R. Tabrizi, evaluated the prevalence of temporomandibular disorder (TMD) in adolescents with and without gum-chewing habits. The researchers took 200 subjects in 2 groups (100 each), who chewed gum for 30, 60, or 120 minutes in a 24-hour period. The results clearly showed an increase in pain and clicking sound in the TMJ. Though some may be affected more than others, however, excessive chewing of gum had clearly shown to adversely affect TMD signs.

A 2015 study in the journal CNS & Neurological Disorders Drug Targets, by a team of Italian researchers led by G. Lippi, analyzed a number of previous studies and reports to assess the link between chewing gum and headaches. The researchers concluded that headache attacks may be triggered by gum-chewing in migraine patients and in patients with tension-type headaches.

Does chewing gum reduces face fat? The answer is straight away no. So, if you like to chew gums, please do so in moderation, but for god, sake doesn’t link everything to fat loss or weight loss. Somethings are just for enjoyment, and let them be that way.