Ideal Body and Social Media

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During childhood, young girls strut in their mother’s glamorous clothing and high heels. In the eyes of the young, fashion promotes glitz and glam. Thousands of adolescent females respect the fashion media as well as what it entails: manufacturing merchandise, beauty, advertising and promotions. Social media is constantly booming with interests and idolization of the fashion industry. However, it frequently slips through our mind what kind of effect the media has on our adolescent generations. Does the media put a strenuous toll on their audience by implicitly favoring “body ideals” which in turn creates body dissatisfaction? I believe as a society, we can combat the hidden pressure of the media by simply understanding their advertisement and direct approaches to impose beauty ideals on adolescents.

In the Media Psychology journal entry Influence Of Mass Media On Body Image And Eating Disordered Attitudes And Behaviors In Females: A Review Of Effects And Processes, Lopez-Guimera and researchers worked to reveal the high correlation between media and adolescent females ideal of beauty. Publication of this research provides insight to the audience of how to combat the irrational beauty standards set by the fashion industry. Through a series of studies, the research hones in on different multimedia technologies that affect adolescent females image of beauty and enhance a drive for thinness. Using cross-sectional studies, Lopez-Guimera and his researchers were able to link participation in fashion magazine articles to increases in female body dissatisfaction. Experimental studies focuses on how crucial television factors into a female’s thin beauty ideal. Finally longitudinal studies used self-reported surveys to find the associ...

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...ation between the media’s beauty ideals and a female’s distaste in her body. I think ethnicity and culture plays an essential role in the effects from the media but their role is unclear or not presented within the data. However, an overall causal relationship can be established and society needs to ban together in order to secure a resolution.

Works Cited

Lopez-Guimera, Gemma, et al. "Influence Of Mass Media On Body Image And Eating

Disordered Attitudes And Behaviors In Females: A Review Of Effects And Processes."

Media Psychology 13.4 (2010): 387-416. Academic Search Complete. Web. 25 Mar. 2014.

Tiggermann, Marika, and Amanda S. Pickering. "Role Of Television In Adolescent Women's

Body Dissatisfaction And Drive For Thinness." International Journal Of Eating Disorders

20.2 (1996): 199-203. Academic Search Complete. Web. 25 Mar. 2014.

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