Why do we get dark bags under our eyes? - Big Questions - (Ep. 25)

Hi, I'm Craig, but you can call me Eyebags, and this is Mental Floss on YouTube

Today, I'm going to answer Bored During School's big question, Why do we get dark bags under our eyes when we're tired

I don't know if you know this, Bored During School, but your username goes really well with your question

Maybe you do know. Maybe you don't. I don't know. Anyway, dark circles and eyebags are actually two different things

If you get dark circles under your eyes, you can thank your genes in addition to tiredness

As for bags, those are a combination of a few different things. Things we will discuss after this intro. Let's get started

First, let's talk about what's actually going on under your eyes

The skin itself is very thin, and it covers muscle, fatty tissue, and blood vessels

But as you might remember from our episode on whether or not deoxygenated blood is blue

the blood of light-skinned people often appears bluish to us. So how dark that area appears has a lot to do with skin color and thickness, and there's

There's an additional darkness that comes with genetics in some people. One popular theory as to why they stand out more when we tired is that blood vessels have grown in size When someone is tired their cortisol production increases which results in more blood and larger blood vessels Another possibility is that blood increases in that area just from laying horizontally all night What about

the bags though? Well, we're not really sure. It hasn't been well studied yet. There seems to be a correlation with age. For a long time, it was believed that as people get older

the fat that used to sit in the skin underneath the eyes moved into new spots in the body

But a study in 2008 showed that fat under the eyes actually experienced an increase in volume

So older people will have more bags under their eyes whether or not they're tired

Still, tiredness will make them even more noticeable because water fills up the fatty tissue in the under eye area

The same thing happens when someone eats a lot of salt or has allergies. Or goes like this

Gravity also affects the eyes with time. I know it affected me. When I saw that movie, I was like..

Wow! Now, with actual gravity, the tissues just start to droop a little more

Because of that, experts also recommend not lying flat in bed. Thanks for watching Mental Floss on YouTube, which is made with the help of these nice bags

If you have a big question of your own that you would like answered, leave it below in the comments

See you next week