Facial Soap vs. Cleansers: Is One Better Than The Other?

NoahJenda

I'm reading a lot of conflicting information about what is kinder to my face: cleaners or facial soaps.

I understand that facial cleansers are detergents and contain ingredients like Disodium laureth sulfosuccinate, Cocamidopropyl betaine and Sodium Cocoyl Isethionate.

Soaps, particularly the artisan soaps I've been considering, often appear to be a blend of various oils such as avocado or olive oil, as well as moisturizers like cocoa butter and shea butter. Some also contain saponified tallow or lanolin.

Do mild facial cleaners really strip out too much of my skin's natural oils, as some soap makers claim? Can facial soaps be more drying to the skin, as the makers of some facial cleansers claim? Is there any advantage to using one type of product or the other?

NoahJenda

Here is a bit more information to add to my question:

There was a recent discussion of soaps vs. cleansing bars on a forum that a I frequent, which has a main focus on traditional shaving. Here is the thread, which includes a number of posts by artisan soap makers:

http://badgerandblade.com/vb/showthread.php/324846-Traditional-Soap-vs-Cleansing-Bars

One of the soap makers made the following statement:

"Cleansing bars are not soap, they are detergents. Detergents are good for washing dishes and clothes because they do an excellent job at removing grease. Therein, however, lies the problem and the reason why they should not be used for cleaning your hands: detergents not only remove the grease from food, oil, etc., they also remove the good oils that are contained in your body. This is why people use lotion after a shower. The lotion replenishes the oils that the detergent stripped away from the skin. One would not need that lotion if one had used real soap.

Real soap is the result of a chemical reaction between fatty acids and one or two bases. To make soap, you need oils and/or fats and lye. The byproduct of this chemical reaction is glycerin. Most of the "soap" you purchase in stores does not contain this naturally-occurring glycerin because the "soap" manufacturers have removed it because the glycerin is worth more than the soap itself. If a commercial "soap" does contain glycerin, it almost always contains glycerin because the "soap" manufacturer added back a little bit for label appeal. This is usually given away by the addition of sodium chloride, salt, on the ingredients list."

Another soap maker said this:

"A bar made by superfatting unrefined Shea Butter is great for dry skin. 5% Shea is a good median value to notice a real difference. Oatmeal and Shea are good for problem skin like eczema. Lanolin is fantastic for locking in moisture. Some people get skin irritation from lanolin, however, I suspect a lot of them could be attributed to low quality lanolin or refined liquid lanolin. I've never found anyone who had a problem with semi-solid unrefined lanolin. Finally, the quality of the oils really makes a difference in the resulting fatty acid profile of the soap and how your skin reacts to it."

As someone with no background in chemistry, it's hard for me to know how much of this information is accurate. I'm also unclear about whether the soaps made by these vendors might be good or bad for my face.

What do the Beauty Brains think?

Right Brain

I found a study published in the journal of the Society of Cosmetic Chemists ("Forearm wash test to evaluate the clinical mildness of cleansing products," 1988, Vol 39.) which answers this very question.

Researchers tested a series of cleansing bars made with a blend of synthetic detergents and soap, pure coconut soap bars, and superfatted coconut soap bars. They washed volunteers forearms with the various soaps over a two week period and then measured the three effects: smoothness of skin, redness of skin, and dryness of skin.

The results showed that a pure coconut soap bar was the worse overall. The synthetic-soap bar (made of Sodium Cocoyl Isethionate) was the best. The superfatted soaps were somewhere in between.

Basically, the synthetic detergents make the soaps MORE mild! So unless the artisan soapmakers have different data from a similar study in another peer reviewed journal, I say the answer is pure soap is more irritating.

rozy

Sometimes they just outright lie... that makes me annoyed at a company.

neroli77

So far I've been learning the same, especially with the example surfactants NoahJenda listed, and that leads me to another question I've had - with very sensitive, mature (will be 50 in a couple weeks) skin, I've really loved some of the no-rinse cleansers that you just wipe off with a soft cloth.

Nothing I can name right now, but as someone who's learning so I'll be able to make things, I wonder if anyone still uses those, and more to the point, how would they work? They seemed to do the job okay, but even with the plethora of recipes and ideas out there, I haven't seen anything about a plain old cleaning cream, with no surfactants, and would love to understand the idea better.

NoahJenda

Thanks, Right Brain!

I don't think the soapmakers have access to any different data, nor do I think they look to peer-reviewed journals to support their ideas. They are focused on selling their products, and while I don't think they intend to deceive anyone, some of the arguments they use sound like the "Appeal To Nature" logical fallacy: the idea that that things that are "natural" are better or healthier or otherwise superior. Olive oil, cocoa butter and tallow sound more "natural" than Sodium Cocoyl Isethionate, and there is a certain type of consumer that prefers to recognize the names of ingredients whether they actually make the products better or not.

As you noted, the study you quoted points out that mildness decreased in products with high levels of coconut soap. So the "natural" sounding ingredient (coconut soap) was actually worse than the "unnatural" sounding ingredients in facial cleansers.

Howdy, Stranger!

Categories