Are you confident enough to share the “real” you online? A survey conducted with 1710 participants, has revealed that 50% of the participants confessed to using a face enhancing application, before posting the picture on social media ("Afraid To Be Your Selfie? Survey Reveals Most People Photoshop”, 2014). Statistics revealed that men edit their pictures as frequently as women, this could be fixing blemishes or completely transforming the picture ("PicMonkey Survey Reveals Photo Editing Habits of Men and Women", 2014). Standards of beauty are greatly influenced by social media with the rise of feature enhancing applications, enforcement of unrealistic standards, and through the increase of societal conformity.
Advancement of technology has
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With the developments of the internet, and frequent use of social media beauty standards are getting corrupted. There are various types users, and their intentions differ. Users are known to share their images on online platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and more. The images they share online may have a negative impact on the users that view them. In social media, the appearance of thin bodies is known to have a negative impact on its users. On a daily basis, tons of images of individuals are shared online. An online survey was conducted with questions regarding internet addiction, internet appearance exposure, body image and self-esteem. The results showed that excessive use of the internet was correlated with the desire for thin body image, and a decrease in self-esteem in which may was found to cause body image concerns, and enforcement of thin-ideal body shape ideology on the participants (Stanley, Barn & Short, 2015). The reinforcement of these unrealistic beauty standards doesn't end online. Mass media is known to have a negative impact as well. Magazines, television all enforce an ideal body image. Models in magazines are also portrayed as unrealistically thin figured. Specifically, in a study conducted with 144 female undergraduates showed that exposure to thin images intensified body discontentment and negative mood (Tiggemann, Polivy & Hargreaves, 2009). Therefore, …show more content…
Societal conformity refers to the idea of alternation of thoughts and behavior to what is considered to be “liked” or “true” in the society. Celebrities and online influencers are greatly influencing the fashion trends, perceptions of beauty and creating norms. At times trends are created and enforced by them. With this power, they are able to manipulate what is acceptable in beauty standards. Feather eyebrow trend was created by a makeup artist who has a big influence on Instagram. Stella Sironen shared a picture of her new founded trend on her account on 9th of April,2017 with the caption introducing her new trend. After that, her picture got a ton of likes and comments, and people started to recreate it. It was named as a trend due to the number of people recreating the look. It should also be noted, some people did not like the trend and shared their opinions on the comments. In spite of that, the trend is maintained which shows how societal conformity has altered opinions and users followed online influencers. Celebrities and online influencers use social media platforms to share their conceptions of products at most related to the beauty and the fashion industry. Users are trusting their opinions on products, which are used as grand strategies to sell products and shape beauty conceptions. A study conducted with Instagram users revealed that the online
From newspapers, magazines, television, movies, and the Internet, people are connected to the media in so many ways every day. Media plays a huge impact on daily life, telling the public what the newest trends are, events that are happening in day-to-day life, and scandalous stories of elite individuals involving politics, fame, and money. From young children to middle aged adults, people are constantly fixated on the images the media portrays for how they should look. “Body image is defined as “perceptions of and attitudes toward one’s own physical appearance” (Burlew & Shurts, 2013, p. 1). The media has an impact on how society and individuals view themselves and each other.
Media has a negative impact on females’ body image by promoting artificial beauty. Women often become dissatisfied with their bodies, which cause them to develop eating disorders. Body image affects a woman’s perceptions and feelings about their physical appearance when looking in the mirror. The media portrays unrealistic beauty of women who are thin with perfect hair and make-up. Many women who expose themselves to the unrealistic standards of the media often idealize, covet, and become very insecure. The many women who do not expose themselves would influence others to perceive their physical appearances as beautiful. “Many popular magazines for females tell women to focus on their physical, outer attributes (i.e. body shape, muscle tone, bone structure, hair, makeup, clothing, etc.) and rarely mention the importance of being smart, sophisticated, funny and/or possessing many other positive attributes that have nothing to do with physical attributes” (Sparhawk 1). Obviously, the media’s representation of the thin ideal connects to the majority of body dissatisfaction and eating disorders. In other words, the media’s use of unrealistic women sends a hidden message that in order for women to be beautiful they must be unhealthy. The importance of physical appearance is encouraged at an early development for most girls. For these reasons, the connection between media and body image is very important because low body image will lead to eating disorders and potentially death.
Groesz, L. M., Levine, M. P. and Murnen, S. K.. (2001).The Effect of Experimental Presentation of Thin Media Images on Body Satisfaction: A Meta-Analytic Review. Department of Psychology
Tiggemann & Miller (2010) studied the relationship between body image and media exposure, particularly, Internet appearance-exposure. They found that thin-ideal internalization and appearance-comparison were significant mediators between Internet appearance exposure and weight dissatisfaction among teenage girls. Not only female adolescents are susceptible to experience this phenomenon, but also male adolescents. One study aimed to fill the gap to improve the understanding of whether adolescent boys experience decreased body dissatisfaction from higher social media exposure to the same degree as girls. This study found that social media sites have detrimental consequences on the appearance-related concerns for boys to the same extent as girls (De Vries, Peter, de Graaf, & Nikken, 2016). In parallel, two experimental studies intended to examine the potential impacts of exposure to attractive or unattractive Facebook profiles pictures on body satisfaction level on male and females. Findings showed no significant differences between both genders after observing the same Facebook pictures. Participants from both genders reported poor body satisfaction after being exposed to more attractive users than less attractive ones (Haferkamp & Kramer,
The sociocultural approach to the issue of body image among women states that women receive harmful and negative cultural messages about their bodies. These messages can come from the media as well as from family and peer influences (Swami, 2015). By promoting the thin ideal for attractiveness, the media contributes to women rating their bodies more negatively and thus increases their likelihood of developing eating disorder symptoms (Spitzer, Henderson & Zivian, 1999). In a meta-analysis studying the effects of media images on female body image, Groesz and Levine (2002) found that women’s body image was significantly more negative after viewing thin media images than after viewing average or plus size models. Harmful body messages from family can be direct, such as verbal criticism or teasing, or in...
Throughout time, the most controversial subject among female’s health has been body image. Society and our culture molds females’s brains into believing that being thin is what will fulfill complete happiness. Being thin means you are more successful, loved, attractive, and overall truly beautiful. Thin women are seen as having an altogether perfect life. However, there is another female figure that is seen as undesirable, hopeless, mainly disliked by most. This type of woman is the curvy or larger female. If one were to go out on the street and gather a group of men and women and show them the thin vs. large female and which one is more attractive, most would say the thinner is. Thus, we deny the larger women because they do not fit societies norms. Thin women are timid to turn into this other that is not widely accepted. To this extent, society and our culture have constructed a monster.
According to Maggie Shiffrar, Ph.D., body dissatisfaction is defined as “a negative subjective evaluation of the weight and shape of one's own body.” Body dissatisfaction develops in both men and women. In an article written by Christopher J Ferguson, women experience more dissatisfaction with their bodies than men. Men suffer from muscular dissatisfaction, whereas women suffer from weight dissatisfaction. This article deems the media as one of the explanations for why this occurs. Women who already suffer from body dissatisfaction are more likely to experience negative outcomes when exposed to the models in fashion
Groesz, L., Levine, M., & Murnen, S. (2001). The effect of experimental presentation of thin media images on body satisfaction: A Meta-Analysis review. International Journal of Eating Disorders, 1-16.
Brit, Harper, and Marika Tiggemann. "The Effect of Thin Ideal Media Images on Women's Self-Objectification, Mood,and Body Image." Sex Roles 58.9/10 (2008): 649-657. Academic Search Complete. Web. 18 Oct. 2013.
Yamamiya, Y., Cash, T. F., Melnyk, S. E., Posavac, H. D., & Posavac, S. S. (2005). Women's exposure to thin-and-beautiful media images: Body image effects of media-ideal internalization and impact-reduction interventions. Body image, 2(1), 74-80.
The overwhelming idea of thinness is probably the most predominant and pressuring standard. Tiggeman, Marika writes, “This is not surprising when current societal standards for beauty inordinately emphasize the desirability of thinness, an ideal accepted by most women but impossible for many to achieve.” (1) In another study it is noted that unhealthy attitudes are the norm in term of female body image, “Widespread body dissatisfaction among women and girls, particularly with body shape and weight has been well documented in many studies, so much so that weight has been aptly described as ‘a normative discontent’”. (79) Particularly in adolescent and prepubescent girls are the effects of poor self-image jarring, as the increased level of dis...
Technology has drastically influenced the increase of marketing and the perpetuation of false beauty standards society upholds for women. THe internet has led to the creation of social networking sites that allow content to be shared by multiple persons. Many artists also advertise their endeavors to other outlets to such as Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and Youtube. This allows fans to disseminate and market their favorite artists as
The pattern is similar for the portrayal of women on television, magazines, and other parts of the media. The way media represents women are for them to be thin-like models and other women on television to be the high standard of “attractiveness” to others. The advertising involved targets young teenage women and feature these models that are portraying desirable items, and the “norm” is for these women to be slender and beautiful (Vonderen & Kinnally, 2012). Research has been done to prove that media’s pressure on being thin causes women to be depressive and negative feelings about themselves . Women’s view are skewed and perceived incorrectly of what the typical female body should be (Haas, Pawlow, Pettibone & Segrist, 2012).
As times passed by in the human evolution we gained the knowledge of the use of technology which is now evolving with human needs. Over the past decade, the enlargement of technology has knowingly improved, from Samsung to iPhones and portable devices that enrich the media, they help endless forms of communication between followers and brands seen on the media. The use of social media is becoming more prominent in society; its use for almost anything, from online shopping to following tips for a wealthy lifestyle to keeping up with the latest trends. As much as humans deny the impact and the utility of social media in their daily lives, it alternates their visions on beauty. The use of standards in social media modify perceptions of both women and men.
Most women come in contact with sources of social media at least once a day or more; these interactions can have detrimental effects on overall health of women and young girls. Social media influences women’s desire to change their appearance because photographs on these media platforms are seen as part of daily