Paper 2

Addie Hansen 

University of Iowa

Body Image Issues Today

Introduction

Imagine scrolling through Instagram feed and stopping at a picture. That picture is of a beautiful person that everyone thinks is perfect. You see all the likes and comments they are getting on their picture. Then you look at yourself. Do you feel as confident as you did before? Or did that picture bring out insecurities in you? That’s what happens to many people around the world. Throughout history, there has always been an image of perfection that both men and women are trying to achieve and become. Seeing other people obtain those perfections that we don’t believe we have created a negative body image and self-confidence. Something that many people struggle with including myself. I looked through research asking the question about how social media and the world around us effects negative body image in both men and women. Research showed that body image negativity comes from those we surround ourselves with and the media. It impacts women in a more severe way than it does men, and it causes many dangerous eating disorders. 

Changes in Body Image

Today, body image today in the United States is a body type that is almost close to unachievable. The models are size 00 and a height of over 5’10. That is what is considered to be perfect. It wasn’t always like this, however. Throughout history and especially in women, there are different body types that are considered to be beautiful. These changes happen over time and are given off by the media and by people’s reaction. It has never stayed the same, and it is likely to continue changing to what body type is the ideal model and “sex symbol” at that time.

Women Over Time

Women are often looked at as sex symbols by men. There is always one that every guy wants to be with, and every girl wants to be. That person represents what women want to try to look like and what is considered to be the body perfection. Back in the day, it was considered to be Marilyn Monroe who would be equivalent now to a size eight. She was the person to look like and to strive to be. Research shows that the average size American woman wears a size 14 today. Reaching that Marilyn Monroe size from a size 14 is difficult work. But that isn’t enough. Today the “most beautiful” women are not size 8, but size 00. The media portrays these people who are so skinny to all of these people to show that this is now who men want to be with and who women want to be. The size in these images of perfection change as time does. Within just a few decades, sizes can change that much. This leaves women to feel more insecure as people want and expect women to change as the media’s image of them does. Women continually try to reach this body size because it is what they believe they need to have in order to be pretty. 

Women Around the World 

While body images change throughout time, they also change depending on the country as well. When you move throughout the world, what is considered to be pretty is not considered that in other countries. For example, in the U.S. having a tan is part of the image perfection. Being pale is not what people think of when they think of beauty, but that is like that in China. Women who are extremely pale in China are considered to be extremely beautiful. Another example is the height in models. The average model height in India is 5’5, while in the U.S. most model companies will not take you for runway shows unless you are at least 5’10. Each part of the world has their different view on what is beautiful, and women all around the world are still trying to reach that goal no matter what. 

Reasons for Dissatisfaction

Women and even men are often dissatisfied with their appearance in some way. There is flaw about them that they want to change and something they believe is wrong with the way they look. Why? What makes people think that they are not pretty enough or that some part of them isn’t how it is supposed to look? Who makes the rules of what is pretty and what is not? That would be family/peers, and the media. These people and things show off images and talk about things that in their mind because of the way they were raised and what they are being told shaped their minds into what is beautiful and what isn’t. 

Family/Peers

Family and peers are a big influence In how someone looks at themselves. When people are younger, the biggest influence is the person’s parents. The parents have this idea in their head about how their kid needs to look and how much they should weigh, and they can have access to all of that because of the doctor appointments and things like that. Pavica Sheldon explains the research that dads are actually the most difficult on their teenage daughters because of the image they think they should look like as a woman and are very upfront with the fact that they need to have a change in their weight. This is especially hard when the people who are closest to you and telling you that something is wrong with your body. It creates this negative body image that not only do you now have about yourself, but others do as well. When you grow older, it is the peers who now have the biggest influence on you. When kids go to college, they are now surrounded by other people their ideas and thoughts. They begin to get ideas based on what their friends think and what they are telling people that they should look like. At this point too, everyone is maturing in different ways but still people compare themselves to their friends creating a negative body image about themselves thinking that they are the fat friends or that all of their friends are prettier than them. All of these things and the influence of peers can create a negative mindset for young kids and teens that will affect them for a long time. 

Media

 The media is a huge factor today in why people are dissatisfied with their body image. Kendyl Klein does a lot of research on the effects of media on the body image of women. From fashion magazines to social media, the impact is severe. People now have the ability from magazines and social media to see these people who are photoshopped to be as close to society’s level of perfect as they can, which other people see, and think is normal. Klein talks about how people now the ability have to pick out what they want to look like, and they can do anything to get there because of the easy access. Looking through social media and coming across images of others can create insecurity. The thought come into many people’s minds about how they’re skinnier than me, they’re tanner than me, or even they’re getting more likes than me. Rochelle L. Bergstrom, Clayton Neighbors, and Jeremy E. Manheim did research about women and social media habits. They found out that certain women use social media to get affirmation after they experience some self-doubt and insecurities after they are looking through social media. Social media is both a place that can cause insecurities to come out, and to help them go away for a short amount of time. 

Media’s Role in Body Image Issues

Like mentioned in the previous paragraph, media causes a lot of issues. It gives the access to women to be able to pick out things wrong with themselves and how they believe they need to improve in order to achieve their goal. It causes many issues as the models and people portrayed in the media become the idolized body type that they feel they need to be in order to be pretty, and to be happy. 

Social Media

Social media gives access to themselves v others. It allows people to compare how some people look, and then back to how they look. It allows others to compare every little detail about themselves to others until the self confidence is gone. Another thing about social media is that it is always there. Everyone has access to it all the time, so they have the ability to continually go back and compare themselves to not just their friends to but to people around the world, celebrities, and even supermodels. Charles Wagner and Ester Aguirre explain research done about mass media and the way they represent people. Mass media represents people in ways that are unachievable by others. Mass media shows images of women to the public that are extremely edited and photoshopped to the point where there is not one freckle left on their bodies. They show people this image of a fake body image, and that is what people use to strive to look like. Social media creates this ability to photoshop leaving people to try to achieve this perfection that doesn’t exist. 

Magazines 

Magazines have been used for a long time, and are still being used today to broadcast the image and message of perfection. Kendyl Klein did a lot of research on magazines and the negative impact it has on body image. The fashion magazines that you pick up at the store all have the same type of layout to them. They have a beautiful model on the front and a headline for what is inside. They all say things like “How to burn fat fast” and “Flatten out that belly fat” and all about how to lose fat. It is rare to see a woman who is not photoshopped and has curves or something like that on the cover of a magazines. Klein talked to her therapist about this and she advised her to never pick up another magazine in her life because of the negative body image that it gives people. Reading a fashion magazine has the ability to influence people to continue to diet, workout, and do each thing they advise you to do to look like the person on the cover. It makes insecurities when that body image isn’t obtainable, and each article only talks about how to be skinny and rarely how to be healthy and fit. 

Difference between men and women in body dissatisfaction 

Men and women are very different in the way that they think about their bodies, the way the work, and the entire body image issue topic. Women are more likely to be affected by body dissatisfaction, but that doesn’t mean that men do not experience it either. It comes in different ways and from different people.

Men

Like women, men can face body dissatisfaction as well. Adrian Furnham and others looked at research into what affects does body image have on men that is different than women. When looking at the research they found that men are more likely to get their body dissatisfaction from peers and family than from mass media. They face peer and family pressure to have a better body and they often worry about failure to meet the standards of the people close to them rather than dealing with societies standards. A misconception about body image issues is that it does not always need to be bigger people wanting to be skinny, it can be people trying to weigh more. That is exactly what research shows in men. Men are likely to want to be heavier than lighter because of the typical muscular standard that society creates for men. Men still face the body image dissatisfaction, but it is not near as much as women face it. 

Women

Women face more body image issues more than men because of the pressure from both those around them and society. Charles Wagner and Ester Aguirre talk about how half of American girls aged 11-16 are unhappy with their body image. Due to the influence on these kids, at such a young and youthful age, 50% of them are already facing body image issues. It is much worse for women than men because of the high number of people who are unhappy with how they look. They look further into the research to see why. They found out that because throughout history women are seen of as physical and sexual objects. Their social value they have is most of the time indicated through the way that they look and how they present themselves in their appearance. It is more important for the way a woman looks and presents themselves than a man, causing more women to have body image issues and to deal with the lack of confidence in their body. Many times, the only way people think they can achieve this is through eating disorders. 

Eating Disorders

Women and men all around the world are subject to eating disorders. Eating disorders start when someone is trying to achieve a certain look, so they begin changing the way that they eat so they can achieve that body image. Pavica Sheldon does research on the amount of people in America who experience eating disorders. She found out that 1 out of 100 adolescents are starving themselves, sometimes to death and 4 out of 100 binge and purge or use laxatives to help them lose or maintain a certain weight. That is a lot of American kids who have decided they need to use extremely dangerous methods in order to achieve a certain goal look to themselves. Due to all of the influences that I explained before this, kids think they need to put themselves in danger in order to show society that they are pretty enough or skinny enough. The eating disorders in the U.S. are statistically shown to be increasing, and there needs to be a way were kids do not think that eating like this is the only way to achieve their goal weight, and that being stick thin doesn’t mean perfection. 

Conclusion

In conclusion, I found out that many people struggle with body image issues from mass media and family/peer influences, and that many struggle with eating disorders. The influence all of these things have make people believe that they need to achieve a certain perfection image that society has because of the image they are putting out there. No one knows what perfect is, but through influence, they are forced to believe what is shown to them. What research doesn’t show however is if the eating disorders in the U.S. are increasing and there is a correlation between eating disorders and media, why continue to post pictures of stick thin models?