Research: Social relevance

 In some cultures, nail art can be tied to the concept of femininity and the sense of belonging in a group of females.

Nail art is also a way to create its own identity through fashion, using colours and shapes as a disruption of childhood and entering to the female teen/adult world, also leaving the influence of their parents to create their own selves.

The nail is also part of the puzzle of mounting the gender identity, the nails for teenagers and adult women represents a piece of the symbol of what is a woman and how the woman should present herself. Though the women use nail art to express their womanliness, the different types of art define as a woman with particular personality, as using French manicure (delicate) or using black nails (aggressive).

The trend of metrosexual (term first said in 1994, but became a trend a decade later) men in the 2000s brought to the males also the sensibility of taking care of their hands and nails. As David Beckham, demonstrating how a football player, a husband, and a father could also take care of himself, showed men that they could also invest money and time in appearance and still keep their masculinity.

Before the metrosexual trend, the punk subculture used the black nail polish in a “dirty” way to show how rebellious they were against social rules, with the nail polish in a role of showing their disdain to any rules and meant to shock the society.