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Media And Body Image Essay

1373 Words6 Pages

RATIONALE AND OVERVIEW

1.1 INTRODUCTION

The following chapter provides a brief background and insight discussing and describing the influence of the somatology and related industries’ media regarding the way women perceive their body image. This, from here on will be referred to as “the media”. The aims, objectives, and purpose of the study and research design will also be outlined. The study investigates whether the media influences the way South African (SA) women perceive their own body image.

1.2 BACKGROUND AND RATIONALE OF THE STUDY

In a world of advertising, companies use images they believe will market their products successfully. The globalisation of the media has also paved the way for print and television advertisements to be viewed all over the world. Along with these images come images that may strengthen the probability of stereotypes including those about women. Today there are only a limited content of advertisements that do not include an image of a young slender female advertising a certain product. Through the media, all women the world over are exposed to the Western ideal of beautiful women with slender, ageless bodies (Poorani, 2012:1).

According to Cohan (2001:324) advertising often develops its own values, artificial or false, of whatever is good for the consumer. He states that advertising …show more content…

For the purpose of this study body image will be defined as: a person's thoughts and beliefs (cognitive), perception (perceptual), attitude (behavioural) and feelings about their own physical appearance (affective), usually in relation to the media, other women or in relation to their sociocultural beauty "ideal". It is an individual's concept of his or her own body (Viviani, F., Dionisio, E., Biague, F. Bagnol, F., Zecchinato, C. & Scarcella, F.,

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