< http://www.newscientist.com/ > NOSE PICKING is a form of human behaviour that has received far too little scientific attention, but at last that neglect is being redressed. In the June issue of The Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, Chittaranjan Andrade and B. S. Srihari report on a study of nose picking in a sample of 200 adolescents from four urban schools.
Almost the entire sample admitted to nose picking, the authors tell us, with 17 per cent considering they had a serious nose-picking problem. Pointing out that "there is little world literature on nose-picking behaviour in the general population", the authors conclude that "nose picking is common among adolescents" and that "nose picking may merit closer epidemiologic and nosologic [sic] scrutiny".
Perhaps most important of all, Andrade and Srihari introduce a new term for the activity--rhinotillexomania. You may care to remember that the next time you are looking round at other drivers in a traffic jam.