Women's Body Image Problems

The issue of women’s body image problems is greatly significant in today’s society. Many women around the world today are experiencing or have experienced body-dissatisfaction in their everyday lives. Women are constantly viewing traditional media and social media websites, that heavily have the appearance of models, the thin ideal, and many surgeries celebrities have had done to make themselves look better. This then consequences young girls and women into wanting to change themselves, and they long to look like the models they see from media. I as a teenage girl, see other girls experiencing body-dissatisfaction every day at school. When going to school you slowly see girls starting to wear the same things, wear their hair the same, and
I then found the article, ‘“Who Thinks I Need a Perfect Body?’ Perceptions and Internal Dialogue Among Adolescents About Their Bodies” by McCabe, et al. I choose this article because it discussed body image concerns within young children. Within the article they did a study that surveyed forty boys and forty girls, and then they asked them questions related to the messages that the children receive about their bodies. Within the study they found that many young girls experience body-dissatisfaction. They stated, “Adolescent girls experience high levels of body-dissatisfaction; studies suggest that as many as 90% want to reduce the size of their bodies” (McCabe, et al. 409). They also found that boys were overall pretty satisfied with their bodies, and that they mostly received positive messages about their bodies. “Ricciardelli, McCabe, and Banfield found that adolescent boys indicated that the messages they received from their peers and the media made them feel satisfied with their bodies” (McCabe, et al. 410). McCabe, et al also discussed how many young girls view TV and internet websites which heavily have the presence of the thin ideal. In the end of the study they note that both boys and girls engage in social comparisons, and both sexes receive either positive or negative messages about their
From the social media websites to the skinny models on TV, they all promote the thin ideal, McCabe, et al. found. They also found that from viewing these websites many young girls and women feel the need to change themselves. McCabe, et al. indicated that although both boys and girls receive messages from peers and the social media, the boys tend to have more body dissatisfaction than girls. McCabe, et al’s article was not helpful to my research because they also discussed that many boys also get teased for being overweight, like women. They stated that not only are girls getting teased for their weight but it’s also boys that receive consequences for not becoming the thin ideal. They also found that although boys don’t engage in social comparisons like girls do, many boys compare themselves to famous people who may promote body-dissatisfaction in young boys and men. The questions I needed to get answered after assessing the article from McCabe, et al. are whether or not boys are affected as much as girls, is social media going to stay the same or will it start to change more, and why do boys not compare themselves to their peers but compare themselves to famous people. As I continued to research my topic of social media effects on women, I would have like to find more information on the promotion of bullying from the