Many people experience prickle when wearing some wool garments. Sometimes they may believe that they are allergic to wool. However a study of Garnsworthy et al. Showed that the prickle evoked by wool fabric was not derived from an allergy to wool, and that the cause of fabric-evoked prickle was the mechanical excitation of skin-pain receptors from the coarse fibre ends protruding from the fabric surface. Their study also showed that in some fabrics, fibres protruding from the surface which were able to support 0.75 mN before buckling, could irritate nerve endings leading to the sensation of prickle. For worsted wool jersey fabrics, the corresponding wool fibre diameter was 30μm. Much research work has been carried out on fabric-evoked prickle with worsted wool jersey fabrics. The main method for prickle evaluation was the forearm test. A study of Naylor et al. Showed fine (19 micron) wool knitted fabrics to be non-prickly; prickle increased as the mean fibre diameter increased. Reducing fibre/fibre friction with sili-cones reduced prickle to some extent.
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