Ingredients Lists

Deciphering the ingredients list on a cosmetic can be very useful. It can help you:

determine how the product is likely to function;
ascertain the source of the ingredients;
examine the claims made for it by the manufacturer; and
avoid potential irritant or allergic reactions.

Today, most countries have legislation in place that requires manufacturers to include an ingredients list somewhere on their cosmetic products. Although the legislation differs between countries, generally speaking, the requirement is to list the ingredients clearly and legibly in descending order of quantity. There are exemptions to this general rule in the various jurisdictions including:

Samples, testers as well as salon only products only used by professionals, which generally do not require an ingredients list.
Products such as nail polish that come in a wide variety of shades may be able to list all the colours under used in the product line under the title ‘May contain’.
Fragrances and perfumes (which are complex formulations) may be listed simply as ‘fragrance’ or ‘perfume’.
Products that contain ingredients that are ‘trade secrets’ may be allowed to leave them off the label if the list ends with ‘other ingredients’.
Additional warnings may need to be added to products that contain ingredients where misuse could be hazardous, e.g., aerosols, depilatories, and flammable products.

Despite the general similarities in ingredients list labeling there are some differences between regulatory jurisdictions that you should be aware of if you are purchasing cosmetic online, by mail order or on holiday.

The list of ingredients allowable in cosmetics may differ from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. For example, Japan, the EU and the US disagree on allowable colours.
The EU allows the marketing of some cosmetics with known medicinal effects that are classified as drugs in other jurisdictions. If you live outside the EU you should take this into account.
The degree of policing varies between jurisdictions. Places where regulation is lax may means that toxic ingredients are present in the cosmetic either be deliberate addition or as contaminants .
(See also Mercolized Wax)
Words such as natural, organic, fragrance free, preservative free and hypoallergenic have no agreed definitional standards and should be treated with some degree of skepticism when applied to ingredients.
The legal definition of cosmetic varies from country to country. Some products you might think of as being a cosmetic may in fact be treated as over the counter (OTC) drugs and so, may not be required to have a full ingredients list.
(See also: What is a cosmetic?)

Deciphering the ingredients list

Unlike a therapeutic good (drug), a cosmetic is not one active ingredient in a base, but rather a complex formulation of numerous substances contributing to an overall effect. When trying to determine what is in a cosmetic you face a number of problems:

The chemical names of most ingredients are generally unfamiliar and require decipherment.
There is currently no agreed method of identifying an ingredient and many are listed by one of several names. ‘Palm Oil’ for example can also be called ‘Palm Butter’ or ‘Palm Tallow’. Also, the EU tends to prefer latinised names whereas the US uses Standard English terms. ‘Paraffinum liquidum’ in the EU is ‘mineral oil’ or ‘liquid paraffin’ in the US. The EU also uses a different numbering system to the US for identifying colours.
There are tens of thousands of ingredients that can be used in cosmetics which makes it difficult to ‘read a label’ at the place of purchase.
Some ingredients have more than one function in a product. This makes them particularly good for cosmetic chemists but can make it difficult to determine their use in the cosmetic. It can also lead to claims for the product which, although ‘factually true’ are marginal at best. For example, tocopherol (Vitamin E) may be advertised as a ‘skin vitamin’ when, in fact, its primary use in a cosmetic is as an antioxidant.
The same ingredient can have different functions in different products. Titanium dioxide for example may be used as a whitening agent in a powder but be incorporated into a cream primarily to protect the skin against UV radiation. This can depend on such factors as the type of product the ingredient is incorporated into and the quantity of the ingredient used.

Difficult but not impossible.

Like all things, reading ingredients lists gets easier with practice. Start with products you use regularly. In order to determine the function of a cosmetic ingredient you are going to need a good reference source such as Winter’s “A Consumers Dictionary of Cosmetic Ingredients” or search online. Fortunately, the introduction of the International Nomenclature of Cosmetic Ingredients (INCI) means that most of the more chemical sounding ingredients are listed have been standardised. There are a number of places online where you can get INCI lists of the more common cosmetic ingredients along with their function. A good place to start would be www.cosmeticINFO.org a site maintained by the Personal Care Products Council (PCPC) – formerly the Cosmetic, Toiletries and Fragrance Association (CFTA).

Even with these sources at hand it can be hard to make sense of all the ingredients listed in a cosmetic. One process that might help is classify each ingredient according to function. By doing this you can see how the product ‘works’, as well as seeing which ingredients form the active part of the product (e.g., moisturisers, emollients) or are part of the over-all formulation (e.g., preservatives, anticaking agents, emulsifying agents).

Cosmetic Active Ingredients: these ingredients are necessary if the product is to do its job. For example, skin care products generally contain an emollient to make the skin feel smooth and soft. The emollient would be cosmetic active ingredient.

Assist the Cosmetic Active Ingredients: these ingredients are necessary if the product is to work properly. They include:

solvents used to dissolve the active ingredients;

binding agents such as gums, fats, or waxes which hold the product together;

foaming agents;

chelating agents which remove unwanted metals;

surfactants and emulsion stabilisers which stop oils/fats and water from separating;

texturisers which help the product feel right;

thickeners which stiffen a thin product thereby making it appear richer;

plasticisers which keep a product flexible and stop it from cracking;

film formers which help a product form a thin film;

colours which make products look more appealing. Some colours are also regarded as opacifiers. These make the product less translucent or give it pearlescence;

fragrance which is used to disguise the smell or taste of some ingredients and/or to make the product more appealing;

antioxidants to help stop colour changes in the product and prevent it from going rancid; and

preservatives which inhibit the growth of microbes (bacteria and fungi).

Skin care products

Ingredient lists of skin care products are of particular interest due to their ‘anti-ageing’ and moisturising claims. These claims are sometimes associated with a strange sounding ingredient which may be single compound or a formulation. Needless to say it is hard to guess at the likely effectiveness of the product without knowing what is in it.

Some things to think about when looking at the ingredients and advertising claims of skin care products are:

Humectants are often use to give a moisturising claimed for a product when their role may be to stop the product drying out on the shelf. Humecants are often added to bread and cake for similar reasons.
Antioxidants claims in skin care products are often associated with the presence of vitamins, such as vitamin E. However, the main beneficiary of the antioxidant may be the product not your skin; antioxidants are preservatives, they stop product spoilage.
As a general rule, cosmetics that contain more ‘natural’ ingredients tend to require higher levels of preservatives than those based on petroleum products.
Petroleum based cosmetics tend to have low allergy and irritant rates.
Anti-ageing claims are usually associated with the presence of a sunscreen. For example, the presence of titanium dioxide in a product can allow a manufacturer to make an anti-ageing claim
Just because a compound is used in something else that sounds bad does not mean that it should be avoided. Urea for example, is used in fertiliser but is also part of the skin’s natural moisturising factor (NMF). The NMF helps the skin to hold on to water in its horney layer, the stratum corneum.

Are cosmetics safe?

One of the main reasons you might be interested in what is in your cosmetics contain is to help you determine how safe they are. The web contains a number of sites listing ‘dangerous cosmetic ingredients’ that are supposed be avoided.

Although we know relatively little scientifically about the long-term effects of the use of many cosmetic ingredients this should not make you think of cosmetics as inherently unsafe. Trade organisations such as the Personal Care Products Council (PCPC), formerly the Cosmetic, Toiletries and Fragrance Association (CFTA) have a vested interest in ensuring that ingredients are safe if only to avoid being more heavily regulated. Statistics show that cosmetics are one of the safest products you can buy as long as you purchase them from a jurisdiction with appropriate regulations and trade associations in place.

4th August 2009

Sources

Winter R. (2005). A Consumers dictionary of cosmetic ingredients (6th. ed.). New York: Three Rivers Press.

An example of a cosmetic ingredients list. Some names seem familiar others not.