Surprise! Makeup Ads Are Lying to You

Your makeup is a lie. While the FDA regulates the safety of makeup and other cosmetics, it doesn’t evaluate the veracity of companies’ claims about their product. According to a new study of cosmetics ads, the vast majority of claims made about all those skin-saving lotions and creams and powders are misleading, if not outright lies. 

Researchers at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln flipped through women’s fashion magazines to evaluate the credibility of cosmetic advertising, finding than more often than not, advertising claims in the cosmetics industry were misleading, vague, and even downright false. Most claims of the superiority of one product over another were found to be untrue, and most scientific claims featured in the ads were too vague or omitted important information that would have allowed researchers to test their validity. Only 18 percent of claims were found to be acceptably true, while 23 percent were outright lies, and 42 percent were too vague to classify. 

The analysis only encompassed ads that ran in women’s magazines in April 2014, so it’s arguably limited in scope. But based on what they're selling, it's not hard to believe that makeup companies would use too-good-to-be-true claims. After all, if a bunch of scientists in a lab really did find the fountain of youth, it probably wouldn’t sell for $15 in an over-the-counter bottle.