Self-Image Research Paper

1007 Words3 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: The causes of peer pressure among teenagers

Self-Image Research Paper

Imagine a world where everyone is perfect. Now try to recreate how they got there. It is literally impossible to meet everyone’s standards of perfection, especially society’s, because everyone views it differently. Being perfect could consist of a great personality or a good looking body. Because of the growing use of technology, the mass media have projected a certain way to look, eat, dress, and or behave. Many teenagers in today’s world are affected by society’s projection of self-image. They go through extreme measures just to look like these “perfect” people and in result; harm themselves in the process.

There are many different ways teenagers will try to achieve the image the media gives off. Many go to eating disorders, to lose or gain weight. These can be very dangerous, not only are adolescents harming their health, but they’re killing themselves over someone else’s opinion. Plastic surgery is also gaining popularity in teenagers because it is a quick and easy way to get the image they want. When teenagers go through all of this, some succeed in their original goal, but others end up failing and begin to experience depression which can ultimately lead to suicide.

One of the eating disorders many resort to is bulimia. Bulimia nervosa is the act of binging and purging to compensate weight gain via laxative or self-induced vomiting (www.nationaleatingdisorders.org). Because bulimia is typically practiced with self-induced vomiting, there are many negative effects. These can be anywhere from popped blood vessels in the eyes, to esophageal/bowel rupture and tooth decay. Bulimia affects about one to two percent of young adults today, and 80% of sufferers are female. To coincide with the binging ...

... middle of paper ...

...u, than you.

Works Cited:

“Bulimia Nervosa”. National Eating Disorders Association. Web. 26 May 2014. http://www.nationaleatingdisorders.org/bulimia-nervosa

“Anorexia Nervosa”. Help Guide. Web. 26 May 2014. http://helpguide.org/mental/anorexia_signs_symptoms_causes_treatment.htm

“Binge Eating Disorder”. National Eating Disorders Association. Web. 26 May 2014. http://www.nationaleatingdisorders.org/binge-eating-disorder

“Plastic Surgery Statistics”. American Society of Plastic Surgeons. Web. 26 May 2014. http://www.plasticsurgery.org/

Krucik , George. "What Do You Want To Know About Depression?." Web. www.healthline.com, 16 Dec. 2013. Web. 26 May 2014. http://www.healthline.com/health/depression

“Teen Depression Statistics”. Teen Help. Web. 26 May 2014. http://www.teenhelp.com/teen-depression/depression-statistics.html

Show More
Related

  • Perfection In Hawthorne's The Birth Mark

    798 Words  | 2 Pages

    Societal constructs of bodily perfection have a massive influence on both genders and on all ages. If you look at any magazine, you will see women constantly being compared to each other, whether it is in the “who wore it better” section or in the “do’s and don’ts” part of the magazine, comparing body images and overall appearances. All parts of the media that encompasses our daily lives are especially dangerous for young and impressionable teens because they see people being torn down for trying to express themselves, and are thus taught to not only don’t look like “don’ts”, but also look like the “do’s”. This is dangerous in that women in the magazine set very high standards that teens want to emulate, no matter the cost to themselves or their health. Celebrities have the benefit of media to make them appear perfect: Photoshop and makeup artists conceal the imperfections that are often too apparent to the naked eye. Viewing celebrities as exhibiting the ideal look or as idols will, in most cases, only damage the confidence of both young teens, and adults, and warp the reality of what true “beauty” really is. It makes teens never feel truly content with themselves because they will be aiming for an ideal that is physically impossible to attain and one that doesn’t exist in the real

    Read More

  • Bulimia Nervosa and Antidepressant Drugs

    1828 Words  | 4 Pages

    Bulimia nervosa afflicts mostly women (about 6% of adolescent girls, and 5% of college women). Most individuals with bulimia engage in compensatory activities such as vomiting, laxative abuse, strict dieting, and vigorous exercise (Alexander).

    Read More

  • Anorexia and Bulimia

    1078 Words  | 3 Pages

    A variation of Anorexia, Bulimia ranges from excessive food intake, to an out of control compulsive cycle of binge eating where extraordinary amounts of any available food, usually of high carbohydrate content, may be consumed. Once having gorged, the victims are overcome with the urge to rd themselves of what they hate eaten by purging themselves, usually by vomiting, and sometimes by massive doses of laxatives. Between these obsessive bouts, most are able to accept some nutrition. Whereas the anorexic sufferer fears fatness from anticipated loss of eating control, and unlike the anorexic sufferer the typical bulimic individual is not emaciated, but usually maintains a normal body weight and appears to be fit and healthy.

    Read More

  • Media Influence Over Body Image

    1260 Words  | 3 Pages

    The media has had an increasingly destructive effect on young people who are becoming worryingly obsessed with their body image. The media is saturated in sexual imagery in which young people have to face every day. The sheer volume of sexual imagery in the media today has resulted in the vast majority of young people to become hooked on looking as near to perfection everyday by using the latest products and buying the latest fashions. This used to be enough but lately the next step to achieving perfection is cosmetic surgery. Everyone wants to look attractive, especially teenagers who are not only put under massive strain to succeed but to look beautiful and climb the ranks of the social ladder, and it seems that the only way to achieve the much desired beauty is to turn to drastic measures.

    Read More

  • Major Teen Depression and Its Growing Issue in Society

    1368 Words  | 3 Pages

    National Institutes of Health. “Depression.” National Institute of Mental Heallth. USA.gov, n.d. Web. 20 Apr. 2014.

    Read More

  • Summary Of Daniel Harris's Celebrity Bodies

    1077 Words  | 3 Pages

    If a teenager or pre-teen is focused on particular celebrities and their goal is too look like them, it is not difficult to slip into acting like them as well, or at least being influenced by their behavior and perceived attitudes. The media abounds with bad examples of celebrity behavior, from Justin Bibber driving recklessly to Miley Cyrus parading around scantily clothed, and although every celebrity is not a terrible role model, a disproportionate amount of them can be found to have shaky morals and seem to have let the attention that they receive affect their behavior. In addition, the perfect bodies that most of them display are not realistic and in some cases not even naturally attainable, thanks to the modern tools of plastic surgery, augmentations, liposuction, and other cosmetic surgeries. The media too contributes to the unreal portrayal of models and famous people by using airbrushing on pictures and other editing that lead regular people to compare their bodies to images that are not even humanly possible. The Barbie-like models that girls compare themselves to and the ripped and muscled men that boys compare their bodies to are often completely unnatural and the people who have somehow attained them are,

    Read More

  • Adolescent Eating Disorders

    1663 Words  | 4 Pages

    Bulimia nervosa is a slightly less serious version of anorexia, but can lead to some of the same horrible results. Bulimia involves an intense concern about weight (which is generally inaccurate) combined with frequent cycles of binge eating followed by purging, through self-induced vomiting, unwarranted use of laxatives, or excessive exercising. Most bulimics are of normal body weight, but they are preoccupied with their weight, feel extreme shame about their abnormal behavior, and often experience significant depression. The occurrence of bulimia has increased in many Western countries over the past few decades. Numbers are difficult to establish due to the shame of reporting incidences to health care providers (Bee and Boyd, 2001).

    Read More

  • Eating disorders

    589 Words  | 2 Pages

    Bulimia is a person who binges and purges. The majority of bulimia nervosa patients are female. They will eat a large quantity of food in a short amount of time and then self-induce vomiting or will use laxatives or diuretics. They may also exercise compulsively. This person will can have damaged and discolored teeth, lung irritation, and muscle spasms, electrolyte imbalances that can lead to irregular heartbeats and heart failure and death. They may also have sores on the back of the hand that is for self induced vomiting. According to several resources, approximatel...

    Read More

  • Bulimia Research Paper

    1061 Words  | 3 Pages

    Bulimia ransacks the assemblage of supplements and leaves people with medical issues that last for the duration of their life. At the point when youthful grown-ups endeavor to get in shape by the act of eating and after that cleansing their sustenance, they have no clue about the extreme mischief they're doing to their bodies. The act of bulimia can bring about Long-term medical issues in practically every framework in the body including the cardiovascular, stomach related, excretory, skeletal, conceptive, and sensory system. Utilizing intestinal medicines to cleanse the group of nourishment causes electrolyte uneven characters which harm the heart. Electrolyte unbalanced nature can provoke a heart attack. Heart Attack is one of the main deadly impacts from bulimia. Bulimia can likewise initiate hypertension, serious cerebral pains, seizures, and exhaustion. Bulimia harms the nerves that flag to your cerebrum that your stomach is full. This harm is frequently irreversible. People with bulimia may likewise experience the ill effects of bloating and ulcers. Hunger keeps the kidneys

    Read More

  • Essay on Eating Disorder - Bulimia, the Destruction of Self

    1414 Words  | 3 Pages

    Bulimia nervosa, more commonly known simply as bulimia or binge and purge disorder, is an eating disorder that affects 1 in 4 college-aged women in America, or 1 in 10,000 Americans. The most common misconception concerning bulimia is that it is simply a physical or mental problem. Many people do not understand that bulimia is a disease that affects both the mind and the body, and in its course can destroy both aspects of the diseased individual.

    Read More

  • The Entertainment Industry's Standards of Beauty and Impact on Youth

    951 Words  | 2 Pages

    Have you ever heard of Calista Flockhart, Lara Flynn Boyle, Jennifer Aniston, or Antonio Sabato Jr.? They are all celebrities that the typical teenager idolizes, but these idolizations are not necessarily a good thing. Unfortunately, they are all setting standards of beauty that are not only unrealistic but could prove to be dangerous when trying to be attained. In recent years, there has been a significant increase in the number of eating disorders, steroid use, and plastic surgery among teenagers. The main reason for this trend is that “the beauty ideal has shifted towards an increasing emphasis on thinness” (Brown).

    Read More

  • Celebrity Manipulation

    1037 Words  | 3 Pages

    “Dysmorphia, a condition in which there is dissatisfaction with body appearance, is on the rise as your teen struggles to reach perfection. In fact, in a study by the Keep It Real Campaign, 80 percent of all 10-year-old, American girls have been on a diet.” In advertisements and everyday celebrities, beautiful women/men are the highlight of it all. They create a false image, an unrealistic hope for teenagers. This affects them to follow their lead.

    Read More

  • Bad Role Models

    1689 Words  | 4 Pages

    They need people who they can respect, and who will be a positive influence on their life. Teenagers think that because their favorite celebrity is skinny, they need to be also. This results in anorexia and eating disorders. Several of these can be linked with teens wanting to look like some they are not. According to a poll taken, 40% of nine and ten year olds have tried losing weight, and by the age of 13, 53% were unhappy with their

    Read More

  • What Is Beauty?

    756 Words  | 2 Pages

    In American culture today, society's view of beauty is controlled by Hollywood, where celebrities are constantly in the lime-light. The media watches Hollywood's every move, and is quick to ridicule “A-listers” whenever they dare to gain a few pounds or to let an uncontrollable pimple show. The media has created a grossly distorted mental image of what should be considered beautiful, and with almost every junior high and high school-age girl reading and viewing this message, the idea has been instilled in them as well. This view of beauty is causing many teenage girls to become obsessed with a highly problematic and unattainable goal of perfection.

    Read More

  • Many young people are too concerned with the way they look. What are the implications?

    840 Words  | 2 Pages

    One implication of too much concern for appearance with young people is that there are many health issues that can come from chasing after a certain idea of how a person should look. Every day in the media, young people receive ideas about how they should look from advertisements, television, movies and celebrities. (Skinny celebs a health hazard, 2010). Most people agree that the image shown in these places is actually unrealistic and does not show real people in a natural way. This means that when young people set goals about how they wish to look, they might need to do things that are not good to be able to achieve them. (Brown University, 2014) The most common things are extreme diet and exercise—more and more young people are crash dieting, fad dieting and exercising too much to try and lose weight or get muscles, even those who are already healthy, normal weight. Such behavior can easily turn into an eating disorder such as anorexia nervosa. Some even start smoking or using drugs to control their weight. Because the ideal that they are trying to reach is often hard (Kate Moss) or even impossible for humans (for example a Barbie doll...

    Read More

More about Self-Image Research Paper

Open Document