- thortful reveals Brits’ biggest icks to determine the factors that really make us cringe
- Bad personal hygiene is the UK’s most common ick-causer, with being too arrogant coming in second
- Mullets and speedos are among the common ick-causers
We’ve all been there, cringing at someone speaking with their mouth full, causing you to get ‘the ick’. In fact, Google searches1 for terms like ‘funniest icks’ and ‘common icks’ saw increases of +550% and +170% in the past 12 months.
To reveal just how ‘icky’ icks really make us feel, greeting card marketplace, thortful.com has set out to find the UK’s biggest icks2, to see whether they differ between females and males… and they do!
So, what are the UK’s top 10 biggest icks? Well, number one is bad hygiene!
- Bad personal hygiene – 50%
- Being too arrogant – 38%
- A noisy eater – 33%
- Bad breath – 30%
- Being rude to hospitality staff – 29%
- Spitting on the street – 26%
- Speaking with their mouth full – 25%
- Crude jokes – 19%
- Speaking with a baby voice – 14%
- Sitting on their phone all the time – 13%
Half of Brits find that having bad personal hygiene is a big turn off, often resulting in them ‘getting the ick’, and there’s a fine line between being confident and starting to become arrogant in other people’s eyes.
Though hygiene and personalities topped the list of the UK’s biggest icks, some funny ones appeared among the crowd with 6% of the voters claiming that bad grammar gave them the ick, and others can’t deal with heavy breathing (5%) or mullets (4%).
For females, the biggest icks are:
- Bad hygiene – 52%
- Being too arrogant – 37%
- A noisy eater – 34%
- Bad breath – 33%
- Spitting on the street – 33%
For males, the biggest icks are:
- Bad hygiene – 43%
- Being too arrogant – 40%
- A noisy eater – 31%
- Bad breath – 29%
- Spitting on the street – 28%
Differing from their male counterparts, 12% of females claimed they weren’t a fan of long fingernails, although this didn’t appear to be an issue for males. Both genders agreed that someone being obsessed with their phones would inevitably give them the ick. Over half (51%) of females claimed they’d experienced the ick when going on first dates with someone new, compared to as little as 38% of men.
Commenting on the study, a spokesperson at thortful.com said: “It’s interesting to see the biggest icks across both males and females. We hope that our study helps Brits across the UK to avoid doing something that will make their lover’s toes curl!”
To read more about the study, please visit thortful’s blog here.
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