If children could have a tattoo, what would they choose?

What do children think of tattoos?

There are many things in life that children are not allowed to do. Smoking, drinking and driving for example. These are luxuries reserved only for adults. Another “pleasure” in this category is tattoos. Nobody under the age of 18 is permitted to have a tattoo, even if they have the consent of their parents.

With tattoos becoming more popular in our culture, we wanted to know what children think about this. So, for this survey we asked them, “If you could have a tattoo, what would you choose?” We gave them seven options to choose from: angel/fairy, skull, flower, mythological beast, animal, words/symbols, and no tattoos at all.

You may well be surprised to learn that the vast majority of children – 46% of them – have no intention of ever getting a tattoo. Of those who did want a tattoo, the most popular choice was for words or symbols. 19% of our respondents opted for this. The other choices were quite evenly spread. A mythological beast and an animal both received 8% of the vote, a flower got 7%, and a skull was tied with an angel or fairy, both on 6%.

Almost Half of Children Would Never Get a Tattoo

Tattoos are nothing new. We’ve been creating them for at least 12,000 years. Famously, Ötzi the Iceman, a prehistoric man whose mummified body was discovered in the Alps, had tattoos on his body. Sadly, this part of our culture was frowned upon after the rise of Christianity and it’s only in recent years that the practice has become popular and socially acceptable once more.

Despite the re-emergence of the tattoo, perhaps we should not be surprised that most children do not want one. For a start, having one done is a painful experience. That alone might be enough to put people off. But there is also the lifetime commitment. People’s tastes change as they get older and tattoos can be unpleasant reminders of the past.

To see whether adults and children think the same way about tattoos, we asked grown-ups the same question. And we got almost exactly the same result. 48% of adults would never have a tattoo either. It appears that, on this at least, adults and children do think the same.