Weight Bias In The Media Summary

In the article, Weight Bias in the Media: A Review of Recent Research, Rheanna N. Ata and J. Kevin Thompson discuss the misrepresentation of overweight and obese people in the media. with the increase of overweight people worldwide, the first issue addressed was the disproportionate amount of overweight people on televisions. The statistics showed that only 13% of females and 24% of males on television are overweight. Another issue examined by Ata and Thompson was the way an overweight character was portrayed to children by the media. Cartoons often depicted overweight characters as being unattractive, but sitcoms geared toward children showed very little bias. On the other hand, adult sitcoms perpetuated many biases about the overweight, and rarely showed them dating, in romantic relationships, or having sex. It is also prevalent in adult sitcoms for characters to make fun of each others weight. Weight control advertising was discussed and how they depict the subject in before pictures unhappy and the after pictures happy triggering a subconscious message that losing weight will make you happy. Also these commercials give people the false impression that losing weight is easy with false claims that you don’t have

It is no secret that numerous television shows do not make it past the pilot episode. Even after passing this initial test many others do not make it through the first season. The main criteria for television networks to keep a show on the air or remove it, is how it is rated. The rating is based on Statistical sampling of what consumers are watching. If the statistics of overweight people in the United States, presented by Ata and Thompson, is accurate then the sample used for rating television shows is predominantly overweight. If the group experiencing bias does not feel insulted enough to look away is the issue really that