I know there is nothing more subjective than pillow choice, but I am wondering, with so many types of pillows out there, most of the “objective” review sites that one can find through google seem to lean very heavily towards memory foam or shredded memory foam pillows as their best choice for neck pain and frequently for general purposes as well. In addition, almost all of their recommendations are for pillows sold on Amazon, never through private companies. Is there some element of bias to these sites that is not visible?
Hi Pspa123,
I don’t know whether the sites themselves have any “bias” or not but pillow reviews (like all reviews) can certainly be misleading because they are generally written by people that make choices based primarily on price or marketing information and most likely aren’t aware of and haven’t personally tried the many different types of pillow materials that are available so their frame of reference and comparison is very limited. Like mattresses … a pillow that is “perfect” for one person may be very uncomfortable or completely unsuitable for someone else to sleep on. There are many different types of pillow stuffing that are used in the industry and each one has their advocates and detractors. There are certainly many people that don’t prefer or even like memory foam or shredded memory foam pillows (I am one of them) and that have strong preferences for other types of pillow materials.
A suitable pillow is an essential part of good alignment for the head and neck and upper body because the gap between the head and the mattress and the curve of the cervical spine needs to be supported just like all other parts of the spine. Like mattresses … there are certain “needs” that depend on body type and sleeping positions but with pillows, personal preferences play a more important role because the face is much more sensitive to textures, temperature, smells, and other more subjective “feel” based properties of a pillow. There is more about choosing pillows in the main pillow topic here and the other topics and sources of information that it links to and there is also more information about some of the different materials that are used in pillows in post #5 here that may also be helpful.
Phoenix
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