How to Make Your Hair Stand Up With Static Electricity

Static electricity is a temporary development of charge which can be taken as the imbalance of electric charges within or on the surface of a material. The charge in such a case will stay until it is not taken away by the means of another electric current or electrical discharge. Let me make you understand why this actually happens. When we rub two surfaces together, a development of charge takes place if one of these surfaces is having a high resistance to electric current than the other. In order to make you understand this concept more briefly, here I am mentioning some simple steps which can be followed at home.

How to Make Your Hair Stand Up With Static Electricity

1. Know How Static Electricity gets formed:-

Static electricity gets formed when two surfaces come in contact with each other and get separated. Now at least one of these surfaces should have a high resistance to electric current and thus when it rubs with the other surface, a temporary charge gets generated. It happens in the similar way when we rub a scale against our hair and then bring it closer to small pieces of paper and small pieces of paper get attracted to scale

2. Find an Insulator:-

In our experiment, we will find an insulator first. Let me tell you that insulator is a material which cannot conduct electricity. This can be a piece of wood or even a balloon and thus here we are taking a balloon. In previous point, I had told you that at least one of the surfaces should have a high resistance to electric current and thus a balloon suits the best for this experiment as only an insulator can have high resistance to electric current

3. Rub It Against Your Head:-

I had taken balloon in this experiment because a balloon does not hurts when we rub it against our head, but you can take simply any other insulator depending on availability and personal preference. Now, we will keep rubbing the balloon with our hair for some time. Static charge will get developed and hair will get stuck up with the balloon making them stand up.

4. A Woolen Hat Can Also Do The Same:-

Now we came to know that when two surfaces get rubbed against each other, there is a possibility that static charge will get developed and obviously we can’t rub a heavy wooden piece against our head then what other substance can be bought in use to make your hair stand up like anything? Well, a woolen cap or hat solves your problem hair. When air is very dry in winters and you are wearing a woolen hat, just taking off the hat from your head can also make your hair stand up in the sky. This will happen because air is dry during winters and electrons won’t be able to move off from your hair in such a time.

5. Explanation of the Phenomenon:-

If you ask me to explain why this happens, I will simply answer that it happens because of development of charge. When you rub the balloon on your hair, you are developing a little amount of negative charge. Now when each of your hair is having the same kind of charge, they choose to repel each other like it happens with a magnet when we bring two similar poles closer to each other. Now when each of the hair tries to repel each other, they can’t stay close or lying stacked over each other and instead they choose to stand up in the sky.