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The purpose of this literature review is to examine sexism in the media that contributes to gender expectation problems for women. The social construct theory shows that people are constructing gender through their interactions with others. People are always “doing gender”. Gender changes constantly based on human interactions. Gender roles are reinforced through the media. The media tells people what is expected of their biological sex. It also tells people what to expect of others. It sets standards for how women are supposed to physically appear. Society as a whole starts to conform to what the media says we are supposed to be.

This article discusses the pressures women face in male dominated societies because of the media. Sometimes the media tends to portray women as sex objects, and tends to assign gender roles to women based on the societal norms. The male dominated culture uses different forms of media to express to women the beauty standards that they are being held up to. While not all men share these beliefs they may not know of anything else to believe because society has always taught these views. This article specifically looks at body ideals, body dissatisfaction, height preferences, and cosmetic use.

One part of this study specifically looked at how being thing is an ideal. They took people from different demographics and had them look at two gray scale pictures of women from each established BMI category. They were asked to rate the figure they thought was most physically attractive, the largest figure that they considered most physically attractive, and the smallest figure they considered most physically attractive. They were also asked to rate the figure that appeared closest to their body and the figure w...

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.... People conform to these gender roles by “doing gender” or have expectations of certain sexes. Examining sexism in society will allow for a better understanding of gender expectations for women. Social construct theory examines how gender roles are constantly changing based on human influences. As discovered in the article body ideals, body dissatisfaction, height preferences, and cosmetic use are influenced by what the media says women are supposed to look like and what men are supposed to expect from women.

References

Swami, V., Coles, R., Wilson, E., Salem, N., Wyrozumska, K., & Furnham, A. (2010). Oppressive beliefs at play: Associations among beauty ideals and practices and individual differences in sexism, objectification of others, and media exposure. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 34(3), 365-379. doi:10.1111/j.1471-6402.2010.01582.x