The Negative Effects Of Body Image In The Media

In this day and age, girls and boys alike are faced with many media messages that say they need to look and behave a certain way. The media’s constant obsession with equating thinness with beauty often negatively affects a person’s perception of themselves. The overall idea of body image encompasses much more than one would think. It includes the visual perception of oneself when looking in the mirror, the way a person feels about that visual, how the individual believes they are perceived by others, and the general connection to the physical form one is given. It is often the difference between self confidence and unsurpassable insecurities in many people of all ages. In today’s society, issues with one’s appearance are widely associated with females alone, and even more so

One of the potential negative effects of an individual having poor body image, is the possibility of developing an eating disorder. Unfortunately, these disorders have been stripped of their substance in many media outlets, and the general public fail to see just how life-threatening they can be if they go untreated. There are two main types of eating disorder associated with body-image struggles: Anorexia Nervosa and Bulimia Nervosa. These two disorders each have their own set of symptoms, with some crossover, but often stem from a similar cause— the individual being unhappy with their appearance. When eating disorders are mentioned, the first to come to mind is usually Anorexia, this one is also bears the brunt of most jokes and stigmata surrounding these disorders as a whole. “Anorexic” is haphazardly thrown around as an adjective for females who seem skinnier than what is considered normal, and is also used as a way to shame skinnier people for something beyond their control. In reality, Anorexia Nervosa is a disease that is characterized by insufficient intake of food, which in turn causes often dramatic weight loss, poor self