What is "geophagia"

n. Consumption of clay, chalk or dirt.

n. eating earth or clay or chalk; occurs in some primitive tribes or sometimes in cases of nutritional deficiency [syn: geophagy, pica]

Geophagia (also known as geophagy ) is the practice of eating earth or soil-like substrates such as clay or chalk. It occurs in non-human animals where it may be a normal or abnormal behaviour, and also in humans, most often in rural or preindustrial societies among children and pregnant women. Human geophagia may be related to pica, an eating disorder in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) characterized by abnormal cravings for non-nutritive items.