Remember the quote from the movie Contagion? "The average person touches their face 2000 or 3000 times a day."
As an Acne Treatment Specialist at 916SKIN, I observe people when they come into the acne clinic to see if they touch their face. Patients coming in for their initial visit almost always touch their face repeatedly throughout the consultation. How often? I've never counted. But, once it has been brought to their attention, and they begin progressing through the acne treatment program in Butte County, the face touching decreases substantially with most patients not touching their face at all.
The quote from Contagion was of particular interest to me, and my patients, too - I'm sure. I've been trying to find research that supports this statistic, but have not found anything up to this point. I submitted the question to the CDC. We'll have to wait to see if I get a response. Meanwhile, here's what I found. I won't bore you with too many details...
According to a study by Nicas in 2008, a group of 10 Berkley students touched their face an average of 16 times/ hour. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18357546
A published study in 1973, observed a crowd of a 124 people over the course of 30 to 50 minutes. Researchers observed 29 nose-pickers and 33 eye rubbers according to Nicas.
Wiki Answers falls in line with quote from Contagion, stating that the average person touches their face 3 to 5 times per minute, but I couldn't find any evidence to back up this statement.
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