On a snowshoeing excursion with my great friend Devin Barrus, I repeated the conventional wisdom, "A hat is critical since most of your body's heat is lost out of the head." He flatly declared that was a myth. "What?!," I exclaimed, "Everybody knows this is true." I checked around. Sure enough, everyone knew it was true that the head loses more body heat. We had all heard it. There was some discrepancy over whether it was 20%, 40%, 80% or some other nice sounding figure, but the premise remained intact no matter who I spoke to. Or... could it have been a plot-- a plot to get me to wear the oversize chartreuse green knit hat that grandma crocheted. The truth is out... we've been duped, people! Think about it, if the statement were true, bald-headed people would be suffering hypothermia in mid summer.
Here's some of the evidence for your curious hat-covered mind: http://wildernessmedicinenewsletter.wordpress.com/2007/02/14/heat-loss-through-the-head-and-hypothermia/
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2008/dec/17/medicalresearch-humanbehaviour
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