How do social media and peer pressure influence girls to lose weight? When most people think of "fashion", they imagine clothes of the latest "model" from Paris, New York or London. Fashion is more than just what people dress, it is a way of life because people have adopted fashion in every step in their life. The role of fashion is something that has haunted our society for a very long time. For instance, fashion promotes creativity- inspiring people to express themselves. However, there are people who cannot afford the certain fashionable item and they are bullied for not having the latest fashionable items. Why does society glorify fashion and make it so important? Young girls try to change their lifestyle in order to be in fashion. Many …show more content…
Thus, they compare themselves to the models in fashion magazines or on television; this, in turn, can lead to body shame and is might put women at risk for the development of eating disorders and depression. Their desire to be thin can cause a very serious disease-anorexia. Doctors define anorexia as an emotional disorder characterized by an obsessive desire to lose weight by refusing to eat. It is not about food, it is more an emotional issue. “A new study shows that people with eating disorders do not react to sweet flavors the way healthy people do, however, leading evidence to the hypothesis that brain differences predispose people toward bulimia and anorexia.” As it was mentioned before, anorexia it is not about food and weight, eating disorders are much more complicated than that. The weight related issues are caused by serious issues such as depression, insecurity and pressure to be perfect. The difference between dieting and anorexia is; dieting is an attempt to control weight in a healthy way, whereas anorexia is an attempt to control life and emotions. However, when it comes to anorexia, having a thin body is all that matters and health is not important as long as losing weight is the way to achieve happiness. For this one may practice unhealthy behaviors such as
“Thin” is a documentary film that explores the lives of several women who are undergoing treatment for eating disorders at the Renfrew Center in Coconut Creek, Florida. The film provides an in-depth look at the complexities of these illnesses, including the underlying causes, the physical and emotional toll they take on the body, and the obstacles to recovery. In this paper, we will examine the factors that contributed to the patients' illnesses and the challenges they faced in trying to recover. There were many factors that contributed to the maintenance and development of the eating disorders. The patients in the film all come from different backgrounds, but they share a common struggle with body image and societal pressure to
All three of these articles share one common topic: body dissatisfaction leading to an eating disorder promoted by some type of media. Some degree of body dissatisfaction among women and young girls is consider a norm today. According to one girl asked to describe the “ideal girl” she described it as “5 ft. 7 in., 100 lb. , size 5, with long blond hair and blue eyes” ( Groesz, Levine, and Murnen 1). This ideal is not attainable for all young girls and women and I can only imagine how horrible this would make them feel, always seeing images of ideal beauty and not being able to meet it can cause them to go to extremes to get the body they want.
We use celebrity ‘news’ to perpetuate this dehumanizing view of women, focused solely on one’s physical appearance” (Anniston). Young girls do not have a mature understanding of how those magazines work and how to make a wise judgment about the standards of beauty diffused by magazines. That leads them to try to imitate the pictures in magazines (most of the time those pictures are photoshopped) and try to be in perfect shape with a skinny body and a flat stomach and a low weight. When they can not reach that body and fulfill the standards, they develop psychological issues and have a health
Everyday females are exposed to how media views the female body, whether in a work place, television ads, and magazines. Women tend to judge themselves on how they look just to make sure there keeping up with what society see as an idyllic women, when women are exposed to this idea that they have to keep a perfect image just to keep up with media, it teaches women that they do not have the right look because they feel as if they don’t add up to societies expectations of what women should look like, it makes them thing there not acceptable to society. This can cause huge impacts on a women self-appearance and self-respect dramatically. Women who become obsessed about their body image can be at high risk of developing anorexia or already have
Anorexia is a pathological fear of weight gain leading to faulty eating patterns, malnutrition, and usually excessive weight loss and a refusal to maintain a healthy weight B. Bulimia is repeated binge eating followed by behaviors aimed at preventing weight gain C. Over eating is the action of repeatedly eating past the appropriate amount of food or eating past the point of fullness II. Ways eating disorders effect people (healthandwellness.edu) A. Weight loss, fatigue, dizziness/fainting, brittle hair and nails, menstrual irregularly B. Dehydration, electrolyte imbalance, heart and other organ problems, tooth damage C. Death III. Ways to treat eating disorders A. Therapy to talk about why they began struggling with an eating disorder 1. Eating disorders are normally present from past issues 2.
Anorexia survivor Erin Treloar said “my eating disorder was perpetuated by retouched magazine photos”. Beauty standards has such a giant effect on women emotionally, psychologically and physically. The pressure on women to be thin leads to unhealthy weight loss practices (Battle & Brownell, 1996), eating disorders such as bulimia and anorexia (Thompson, Heinberg, Altabe, & Tantleff-Dunn, 1998) and low self-esteem (Tiggeman & Stevens,
“I’m so fat, why can’t I be skinny just like her!” “How does she get the perfect body, while I’m stuck with all of this fat!” These statements are common among teenage girls of today’s society. Social media of today shows unreal pictures of photoshopped models and the “perfect life”. This leads to discontent of young women with their body and lives.
This constant fixation on physical perfection has created unreasonable beauty standards for women, ones we cannot possibly achieve on our own. Such standards permeate all forms of popular media, particularly fashion magazines and advertisements. Women are bombarded with the notion that we must be thin in order to be desirable. These images project an
The pressure to be thin, beautiful and attain perfection has become a heated discussion in American society today. The way that the media, social factors and other outside influences affect young men and women in the development of their self-image has developed into a major concern. Body dismorphic disorders are some of the hardest illnesses to diagnose but at the same time are some of the easiest to treat. Anorexia is when an individual has a distorted image of their body. Every individual may face a traumatic event or period in his or her life that can cause him or her to lose his or her appetite.
"The Impact Of Advertisements Featuring Ultra-Thin Or Average-Size Models On Women With A History Of Eating Disorders." Journal Of Community & Applied Social Psychology 15.5 (2005): 406-413. Academic Search Premier. Web.
From an early age, we are exposed to the western culture of the “thin-ideal” and that looks matter (Shapiro 9). Images on modern television spend countless hours telling us to lose weight, be thin and beautiful. Often, television portrays the thin women as successful and powerful whereas the overweight characters are portrayed as “lazy” and the one with no friends (“The Media”). Furthermore, most images we see on the media are heavily edited and airbrushed
The idolization of slim figures are blinding teenagers to believe it is a necessity to practice these methods. As Blaid describes society’s perspective, “If you develop an eating disorder when you are already thin to begin with, you go to the hospital. If you develop an eating disorder when you are not thin to begin with, you are a success story,”(26-27) this is to point out how society has manipulated the point of view on health conditions to be viewed as a
So when people look and see that they don’t look like they’re favorite super-model it can put a downer on their self-confidence. This causes many girls feeling that they aren’t good enough in society, society won’t accept them because they aren’t perfect and they start to not like their body. When for many females they can’t lose as much weight as their friend can just because of their genes and how they were born. “The lack of connection between the real and ideal perception of their own body and firm willingness to modify their own body and shape so as to standardize them to social concept of thinness…” (Dixit 1), being focused on unrealistic expectations can cause women to lose themselves and change their attitude on how they view their body, and not for the better.
The media has such an influence on women that their mental perception of themselves can become distorted. Many of them see the pictures in magazines and social media and believe that they need to look like what they see to be counted as beautiful. The problem with this is that all the pictures they are looking at are photoshopped or retouched to perfection. This makes it impossible for girls to healthily look like these ideals because only 5% of the female population in America naturally comes close to portraying these “ ideal” body types. This highly affects females ideas of themselves and can lead to them using unsafe methods of weight control behaviors.
This self-view can lead teenage girls to begin extreme dieting, exorcising or develop a full-blown eating disorder, such as anorexia (Berger 2014). Therefore, it is important for society to encourage young girls to know that they are beautiful just the way they