• Journal of the Society of Cosmetic Scientists of Korea
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• v.32 no.1 s.55
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• pp.65-68
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• 2006

Sensory irritation is one of the important side effects of cosmetics and it is required to develop new products that are more tolerable to the consumers. There are lots of cosmetic ingredients known to induce sensory irritation such as lactic acid, glycolic acid, ethanol, preservatives, fragrances and menthol etc. It is also known that sensory irritation increases by change of pH as well as additional occlusive conditions. The aim of this study is to know various factors affecting sensory irritation due to preservatives (methylparaben, propylparaben, phenoxyethanol and chlorophenecin). We also wanted to investigate the effect of preservatives to sensory irritation according to change of formulations. Our results showed that sensory irritation increased with the conditions of increasing absorption such as packs. We have also found that sensory irritation increased synergistically when to apply two different preservatives together. For example, phenoxyethanol and chlorphenesin themselves have weak sensory irritation potentials, but we observed phenoxyethanol combined with chlorpenesin synergistically increase of sensory irritation potentials. In conclusion, formulation and combination of different preservatives should be considered to reduce the unwanted sensory irritation of preservatives.