About

The Salt and Ice Challenge is a popular dare game which involves pouring salt on the surface of skin and pressing an ice cube against it to test how long the participant can endure the pain caused by the burn. Similar to the Cinnamon Challenge, the game has spawned dozens of videos documenting the challenge on YouTube.

Origin

Though online discussions about placing an ice cube over salt on bare skin date back to as early as 2005^[5], the first video demonstration was uploaded to Break^[6] on July 8th, 2006 (shown below). As of March 2013, this clip has been viewed nearly 600,000 times and has been shared more than 166,000 times.

Spread

Four days later on July 12th, 2006, YouTuber OxZmoran uploaded the earliest known instance of salt and ice challenge video (shown below). Later the same month, a Snopes forum member^[7] inquired about the trick, noting that people were discussing it as a method of self-harm. By October 2006, a similar "Salt and Ice" video was posted to eBaum’s World^[8] for the first time, gaining nearly 500,000 views as of March 2013.

On June 9th, 2007, a definition of the game was submitted to Urban Dictionary.^[9] However, the challenge didn't draw much attention until April 2012, when teenagers who participated in the dare game reportedly suffered burns in Philadelphia^[10] and Salt Lake City.^[11] By June 2013, the challenge had gained global attention after a twelve-year-old boy from Pittsburgh burned a large cross into his back while partaking in the challenge.^[12] The story was featured on The Huffington Post^[13], the Daily Mail^[14], CBS News^[15] and NBC Los Angeles.

Resurgence in 2017

While the popularity of the challenge gradually waned across the United States, it continued to spread on the social media in European countries, with seasonally recurring spikes of interest during the months of December to March, over the course of the following years, including the United Kingdom, Spain, The Netherlands and Italy, among others. In some European countries, like Poland, Germany and France, the fad didn't take off until its massive resurgence in popularity during December 2016, when the salt and ice challenge resurfaced in the headlines after more teenagers in the United States and United Kingdom reportedly suffered severe burn injuries as a result of playing the game, beginning with a schoolboy in Swansea, Wales in late December.

Notable Examples

As of March 2013, there are more than 206,000 search results for "salt and ice challenge" on YouTube.^[1] Additional photos, videos and discussions about the challenge are shared on Tumblr^[2][3] and Reddit.^[4]

Arrest in Virginia

In March 2013, school officials in Dumfries, Virginia found burns similar to those made by the Salt and Ice Challenge on the arms of a nine-year-old female student.^[17] It was soon revealed her 21-year-old babysitter Keedra Smalls had done the Salt and Ice challenge with her in late February, which resulted in Smalls' arrest on a felony child abuse charge on.^[18]

Search Interest

External References