The Innies and Outies of Belly Buttons Quiz

Answer: Fibres from clothes

The majority of the lint is from clothing fibers, although a small amount of it is from dead skin cells and strands of hair. According to a survey that was conducted by a physicist at The University of Sydney in 2001, around 66% of people experience navel fluff. Studies have shown that the less hair in the navel region, the less likely a person is to have fluff in their belly button.

Answer: Underwear

Surprisingly, most belly button fluff comes from underwear due to the direction of the hairs. Fibers from underwear are directed upwards by hairs and into the belly button.

(Dr. Karl Kruszelnicki, University of Sydney, Australia, 2001)

Answer: Cancer

A Sister Mary Joseph nodule is a secondary cancer that can be found in the belly button. Sister Mary Joseph was a surgical assistant in Minnesota between 1890 and 1915. She realised and bought attention to the fact that a particular type of lump in the belly button was often related to cancer that was in its later stages.

Answer: Breast

Breast implants can be inserted through the belly button by cutting into it, inserting a tube and pushing it over the rib cage and up to the breasts and then inserting a rolled up breast implant. After the implants have been inserted they are filled and inflated with salt water. This option is preferred by some people to avoid scars in the breast area.

Answer: None

Your belly button is a scar and its appearance depends on the way in which your body heals the scar. No two belly buttons are the same, even in the case of identical twins and they can each leave their own print.

Answer: Umbilical

The umbilical cord connects an unborn baby with the placenta. It provides nutrient rich blood and is also an exit point for the waste created by the unborn baby. The cord is clamped and cut soon after the baby is born, leaving a scar that becomes the belly button.

Answer: Bellcus

Navel is the more technical term for the belly button. Omphalos is what the Greeks called a belly button. Umbilicus is the name given to the belly button by the Romans.

Answer: Meditation

Omphaloskepsis means to contemplate one's own navel which is used as an aid in meditation. It has been practiced since the 1920s. Greek monks also used a different method of navel contemplation to maximise enlightenment.

Answer: Extra skin from the umbilical cord

It is not known exactly what percentage of the population has an "outie" belly button, but it is known that there are significantly more people with an "innie". Another reason that has been offered for an "outie" belly button is umbilical hernias, although, not all children born with these hernias produce an "outie" belly button.

Answer: Alfred Hitchcock

Alfred Hitchcock was, of course, born with a belly button however; he stated on many occasions that he had no belly button. It is believed that during one of the numerous surgeries that he had done on his stomach, the doctor stretched skin over the belly button area leaving him without one.