Teenagers And Body Image

1204 Words3 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Social media has a negative influence on body image and self esteem among young men

How teens portray themselves can become an issue, especially if they have low self-esteem, are pressured into the “perfect body” or simply follow trends. Teenagers that acknowledge and engage to the fact that they have “imperfections” leads them to want to fix their overall body image in sometimes unhealthy ways. Teenagers need to understand the consequences of a negative body image in order to learn how to accept/love themselves just the way they are. In some, cases low self-esteem is dangerous, especially when it leads to gaining or losing weight. For example, anorexia is being terrified to gain weight as well as a “distorted view of their body size and shape”(“Eating disorders”). Similar to anorexia there’s Bulimia, but unlike anorexia, …show more content…

Young adults with the necessity to hide their health problems like anorexia, lead them to not frequently receiving check ups and in some cases leaving dangerous viruses undetected. As well as not participating in activities, for example, swimming since it requires teens to show their bodies, but teens are not comfortable in doing so and instead don’t participate. Additionally, adolescent that refuse to wear thin breathable clothes during the summer heat for fear of showing their body and decide to instead wear long sleeves, or pants is dangerous and in intense situations causes a heat stroke or in more extreme situations, death. Additionally young adults decide to stay inside and not enjoy themselves with friends outside because of their insecurities. Losing strong and loving connections with family and friends, as a result of this whole situation becomes inevitable. Teens, unfortunately, let having a negative body image affect them so devastatingly in the way that losing their love for friends and family is diminished as their negative conscience takes over them. A negative body image is similar to dominoes where because of the negative body image leads adolescents to a lower self-esteem and later vulnerable, which causes young adults to become depressed or easily pressured into situations teenangers would not be in normally; in all situations teens get pulled into by their negative body image, eventually leads them to a mortifying end, death. Teens need to get informed about loving themselves and get a strong body image because if they stick with the low self-esteem and negative body image the results aren't so pretty as they would hope

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

  • Body Image Persuasive Speech

    562 Words  | 2 Pages

    Now I’m going to give those teens a way to ignore what others think and think about themselves in the most important years of their lives. Body image has become more important that education and it needs to stop. I am going to point this article more towards teenage girls. Although I know guys are self conscious about themselves too I cannot relate to that. Girls when you look in the mirror do you see what you want to see?

    Read More

  • How the Media Affects the Self Esteem and Body Image of Young Girls

    1041 Words  | 3 Pages

    The misconception of what is beautiful can be detrimental to young girls. In a television industry attempt to sell goods, they are depicted as sexy. Creating a need for parents to intervene and present a more realistic and normal view of physical beauty. Today, TV presents sexually based images crafted to appeal to young girls. Unfortunately, they are led to believe that their value is only skin deep, causing flawed expectations, illusions, and wrong information about the truth of the physical body in the real world. In an attempt to look the part some have fallen victim to eating disorders, while others have exchanged childhood innocence for an Adult view of what is sexy.

    Read More

  • Negative Body Image Essay

    1608 Words  | 4 Pages

    If one does not fit this ideal, then they are considered unappealing. Unfortunately, there is nothing one can do to truly change their body image other than think happier thoughts, obtain plastic surgery, or go to the gym to make themselves feel and potentially look better. Popular media is making it extremely difficult for one to maintain a positive body image. They have created the perfect human image that is almost unattainable to reach. The idea of a teenager’s body image is being destroyed by the standards of magazines, television shows, and society as a whole, making it to where it will never recover again. To better understand the effect popular media has on one’s body image, viewing psychology, medicine and health sciences, and cultural and ethnic studies will give a better understanding on the

    Read More

  • Eating Disorders

    994 Words  | 2 Pages

    Typically, people who develop an eating disorder are in emotional turmoil. They want to be in control but feel they are not. Any anxiety, self-doubt, or feelings of failure or inadequacy become tied to how they look. When being thin becomes an obsession, when self-worth becomes associated with slimness, the stage is set for eating disorders. People with eating disorders become preoccupied, even obsessed, with food and weight. Eating disorders can lead to extreme behavior including self-starvation, bingeing, purging, and compulsive exercise. Untreated eating disorder lead to heart damage, depression, permanent health damage, or suicide. Eating disorders-- anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, and binge eating disorder are psychiatric illnesses that affect over five million American women and men.

    Read More

  • Eating Disorders during Adolescence

    1894 Words  | 4 Pages

    An eating disorder is characterized when eating, exercise and body image become an obsession that preoccupies someone’s life. There are a variety of eating disorders that can affect a person and are associated with different characteristics and causes. Most cases can be linked to low self esteem and an attempt to, “deal with underlying psychological issues through an unhealthy relationship with food” (“Eating Disorders and Adolescence,” 2013). Eating disorders typically develop during adolescence or early adulthood, with females being most vulner...

    Read More

  • Media and its Affect on the Teenage Body Image

    866 Words  | 2 Pages

    "Introduction to Body Image: Teen Decisions." Body Image. Ed. Auriana Ojeda. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 2003. Teen Decisions. Opposing Viewpoints in Context. Web. 20 May 2014.

    Read More

  • Impact of Social Media on Physical Appearance

    2383 Words  | 5 Pages

    There has been an increasing amount of internet access across the world. With this access teens have been shown a world of torture and resentment. The mind of teens are craving a sudden desire to be thin. Everywhere you look there is some kind of advertisement or website informing people about ways to get thin or reasons to be thin. This widespread illusion is killing the self-esteem of adolescent teens, mostly girls. “Experts believe that our body image is influenced by media images that tell us we have to look young and slim in order to be beautiful, desirable, or successful” (Powell 22). Yes, the social media world informs us of the things not available to us, but the images they display to their audience is creating a dangerous obsession. Adolescent teens are affected by the images displayed on the screen of a T.V. or monitor, but s...

    Read More

  • Argumentative Essay On Eating Disorders

    1022 Words  | 3 Pages

    Eating disorders can be altered by many things including bullying. One way that an eating disorder can come about into someone's life if is low self-esteem. Negative body images can make someone want to become skinnier. When someone has a low self-esteem it means a person who has a very low image of themselves. They think that they are nothing and aren’t worthy of life. When someone thinks this they could exercise excessively thinking that it will make them skinnier.

    Read More

  • Body Image In High School

    535 Words  | 2 Pages

    When I first started high school, I was very uncomfortable in my skin, but by the time graduation came along my confidence grew considerably. The first few years of high school were challenging because of my early physical development and the fact I was extremely shy. However, by senior year I was beginning to accept who I was and how I felt about my body.

    Read More

  • Teenage Girls and Body Image

    1282 Words  | 3 Pages

    The mass media plays a large role in shaping a teenage and adolescent girl’s body image. By pushing an ideal body type that is uncommon and untrue to life, girls strive, and struggle to obtain this image. When the mass media only shows one type of body as desirable, they are alienating every girl who does not fit into that category. Pushing these ideal bodies onto teenage girls at an important developmental time in their lives can be detrimental to their bodies and their self worth. By showing what a girl should look like, the mass media is damaging the body images of young girls, and unless awareness is raised, could become more and more adverse on young women today and tomorrow.

    Read More

  • The Influcen of the Fashion Industry on Teenagers' Standard of Beauty

    406 Words  | 1 Pages

    Clearly, there is a necessity to curtail the cases of teenagers suffering from body image pressures immediately (Kennedy, 2010). If there are no pressures, there will be surely no obsession with their appearance and there will be certainly no more risks of young women’s health and rise in serious eating disorders.

    Read More

  • Teenagers and Low Self-esteem

    709 Words  | 2 Pages

    Over fifty percent of all teenagers in the United States struggle with low self esteem. Self-esteem is defined as an irrational and distorted view of self that affects the person’s assumptions, interpretations, perceptions, conclusions & beliefs about himself or herself as well as others. This can result in a person being very critical of self and others and/or using poor judgment in decision-making (Questions and Answers about Low Self-Esteem (LSE)). Ninety percent of teenage females aged between fifteen and seventeen want to change at least one physical appearance on their body. Of all the things that they wanted to be changed, body weight has the highest amount. Low self-esteem is a major issue in the United States that results in many unhappy, and problematic teens. Low self-esteem develops into much worse things and people need to take care of it before it is too late for the ones who have it.

    Read More

  • The Pressures of Teenage Life

    889 Words  | 2 Pages

    Teenagers constantly worry about their body image. Magazines, newspapers, and television don’t exactly help to boost their confidence. The portrayal of stick thin woman and body building men forces teens to believe they need to achieve that “perfect” body and look. The biggest issue of these images being broadcasted to teens is the effects that the images have on them. Teenagers who obsess over their body image can experience stress due to trying to impress others, develop an eating disorder, and neglect, and even jeopardize, important aspects of their lives when they focus too much on their body image.

    Read More

  • Young People's Concern on Looks and Its Implications

    866 Words  | 2 Pages

    Many people are very concerned on what they look like or what other people think about them. Young people worry themselves to death about how the look. Some think they are too fat, too thin, too short or too tall and would prefer if they looked like someone else. This phenomenon is widespread among teenagers and adolescents since this is the stage where rapid changes occur both on the physical and emotional makeup of youths. Most youths fall victims to self-esteem issues, which to them is an adequate reason to focus on how they look. Poor body image and low self-esteem are risk factors for the development of weight loss strategies and mental health disorders such as depression and eating disorders (Ahluwalia, 2008).

    Read More

More about Teenagers And Body Image

Open Document