Do Dentists' White Coats Scare Kids?
March 16, 2009

by Nancy Volkers
InteliHealth News Service

INTELIHEALTH - Many kids like beds that look like race cars, or lollipops that are actually medicine. And many don't want their dentist to look like a dentist.

Researchers from Turkey asked 9- to 14-year-old children to choose from photos of dentists wearing four different types of clothing. Just over half of the children did not prefer the usual dentist's outfit of a white coat. About 46%, though, said they wanted their dentists to look that way.

The researchers also divided the children into "anxious" and "non-anxious" groups. They did this by asking each child a series of questions. Anxious children were much less likely than non-anxious ones to prefer a white coat.

Few other studies have looked at how a dentist's attire may affect children's fear.

The researchers are from the Yeditepe University School of Dentistry in Istanbul. The study appears in the March issue of the European Archives of Paediatric Dentistry.