Introduction
Why do young women feel pressure to stay thin?
The purpose of this paper is to prove that peer pressure plays in important part in how girls perceive their self-esteem and body imagine. We go into ways to improve a teenager’s body image with the use of maintaining a proper diet and exercise routine. It goes into keeping opening communication and the drastic things teenagers will do to get the “look”. Surgery and eating disorders are briefly gone over. We go into what types of pressure a teenager will face for example parental teasing, parents encouragement lose weight, and what parents consider the norm. Peer pressure deals with appearance and wanting to fit in. Only 5 percent of women posses the body type that is reflected in the media. We will test 30 girls with a simple survey test with six, yes or no questions. The results will give us a percentage of what has the most influence. I believe if we can determine the cause, we can get to the root of things and make young girls more accepting of themselves and be healthier.
In the classroom, the girls would be all shapes and sizes. Exclusions would be boys, because the focus of this study is girl. My sample needs to be diverse to see the results from my research question. If I choose all tall skinny girls, I would not be getting accurate data. I choose two separate classrooms to insure I would end up with 30 girls. I would use a survey with six different questions. I would give the girls in both classes a letter of intent to explain the survey and the reason behind it.
Dear Student
Confidentiality Agreement: Survey on the need to be thin.
I am doing a survey. The purpose of this survey is to see how much influence is peer pressure to be thin...
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Body image and body change methods in adolescent boys and Role of parents, friends, and the media contributed a number of statistics to this facet. Of the participants from this study, 20% contributed a negative effect to the media with statements such as “I think I have a lot of work to do,” with 12.5% stating that it [media] promoted less eating in order to lose weight and slim down. It also showed that 37.5% of participants felt they were being pushed to go to the gym (Ricciardelli, et al.) The individuals in this study were ages 12-15, showing that the media has a strong effect on adolescent males as well as
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The stage of adolescence contains major changes which can bring stress, confusion, and anxiety. Feelings of self-consciousness, low self esteem and comparison with peers start occurring during this time. Along with the physical changes there is also hormonal and brain changes that affect the adolescent physically, mentally, emotionally, and psychologically. During this time a person can feel tremendous pressure to find their place in the world among a great deal of confusion (“Eating Disorders and Adolescence,” 2013). Body image concerns and peer pressure are heightened during the period of adolescence, and are potential risk factors in the development of an eating disorder. While eating disorders can affects males and females of all ages, the average age of onset for Anorexia Nervosa, Bulimia Nervosa, and disordered eating takes place during adolescence. These disorders are often a coping mechanism for people to attempt to gain control of their situation when they feel helpless among other aspects of life (“Eating Disorders and Adolescence,” 2013). Eating disorders in children and teens can lead to a number of serious physical problems and even death (Kam, n.d.).
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It has been said time and time again that media heavily influences the desastisfied body image, may women and girls enconter. Previous studies have shown how over expouser to the hyper-sexualized ads and images in the media lead to a distortion of body image in women and girls. However, there is yet another factor that influences the decline of body image just as much. Peer competition has been shown to contribute to this decline as well. Peer competition is any rivarly for supermacy amongst those of the same age group or social group. A recent study shows that women’s body dissatisfaction is influenced by peer competition with other rather than depictions of women in the media. Muñoz and Ferguson, (2012) developed a study in order to further understand the influence of inter-peer pressure in body dissatisfaction.
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O’Dea, J. (1995). Body image and nutritional status among adolescents and adults. Journal of Nutrition & Dietetics, 25, 56-67.
The overwhelming idea of thinness is probably the most predominant and pressuring standard. Tiggeman, Marika writes, “This is not surprising when current societal standards for beauty inordinately emphasize the desirability of thinness, an ideal accepted by most women but impossible for many to achieve.” (1) In another study it is noted that unhealthy attitudes are the norm in term of female body image, “Widespread body dissatisfaction among women and girls, particularly with body shape and weight has been well documented in many studies, so much so that weight has been aptly described as ‘a normative discontent’”. (79) Particularly in adolescent and prepubescent girls are the effects of poor self-image jarring, as the increased level of dis...
...olfo Garza, Mariza Galindo (2013).Concurrent and Prospective Analyses of Peer, Television and Social Media Influences on Body Dissatisfaction, Eating Disorder Symptoms and Life Satisfaction in Adolescent Girls. Journal of Youth and Adolescence
Research in psychology today seems to be drawn towards particular fields of interest especially when it comes to understanding human behavior. One of the most common research topics for social psychology is body image and the perceptions that are related to age groups, genders, and ethnicities. Young people today are pressured by society to make physical appearance a dominant factor in their everyday lives, and the pressure is found not only through media influence but friends and family as well (Pavica, 2010). These pressures can affect many different aspects of a person’s life and significantly influence their actions. The aspects affected by body image can include popularity among peers, social comfort, and the attitudes an individual comes to commit to behavior (Lewis & Rosenblum, 1999).
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.
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.