Toy companies are not required by law to list their ingredients or material makeup on the toys’ packaging, but some companies do. The Nee-Doh packages and the Schylling website say that the gel inside the Nice Cube is “Maltose” or “100% Malt Extract” (a type of sugar made from barley) and the Nee-Doh Groovy Glob contains polyvinyl alcohol gel, aka PVA, a common ingredient in glues and cosmetic products. Schylling says on its website that PVA is “used as a coating in pharmaceuticals and dietary supplements.”
According to CR’s experts, the very nature of these ingredients may carry a risk of skin irritation. Tunde Akinleye, a chemist in CR’s food safety division, says that some people are allergic to the proteins in barley, from which malt extract is made. He says that PVA is not by itself a significant irritant, but other additives in PVA glue, such as stabilizers and preservatives, can be.
“Either malt extract or PVA could definitely cause skin irritation, even at room temperature,” says Akinleye, “and then elevated temperatures would make that worse.”
In an email to CR, the CEO of Schylling, which makes Nee-Doh, disputed that these ingredients are potentially harmful and also disputed that they would irritate skin at room temperature. (More from Schylling, below.)
Aside from learning more about the gel ingredients, CR’s safety experts were curious about the chemical makeup and the relative acidity of the toys as well. We bought samples from a cross-section of the market of sensory fidget toys and tested them for the presence of contaminants like lead, phthalates, and BPA. We did not find any of those contaminants.
We also chose eight toys to open up so we could pH-test the inner gel, to see if it might be dangerously acidic or basic. We tested one model of each: the Nee-Doh Groovy Glob, ZaxiDeel Squishy Fidget Cube, Color Changing Magic Arggh Ball Minis, Yoya Toys DNA Balls, Visashine Mochi Squishy Toys, Everyday Whimtastic Handmade Ice Cube Stressball, Playbees Sensory Bounce Balls, and the Nee-Doh Nice Cube.
Seven of the eight toys, including the Nice Cube, which was tied to many of the incidents cited above, had a neutral pH, ranging from 6 to 6.5. But one did not. The gel inside of the Nee-Doh Original Groovy Glob had a pH level of 2—the same pH as lemon juice, or vinegar.
“An extremely low pH poses serious risks for chemical burns and severe skin irritation, especially for children’s delicate skin,” says Ashita Kapoor, associate director of Consumer Reports’ product safety team, who led these tests.
Danilo Del Campo, MD, fellow of the American Academy of Dermatology, agrees: “When the pH is too extreme, either too low or too high, that’s definitely a problem,” and can cause skin irritation, including redness, stinging, or a rash.
“On kids, that’s going to be more pronounced,” Del Campo says. “They’re more prone to irritation because their skin isn’t as thick, and their immune systems aren’t as robust, so they’re more likely to have these reactions.”
