Women Get Depressed by Looking at Fashion Magazines

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Recommended: Media and its influence on body image

A recent psychological study revealed an astonishing truth about the media’s powerful impact on female self-esteem: Seventy percent of women feel depressed after looking at a fashion magazine for three minutes (Women’s Health, Taft College). The media’s excessive use of photoshopped models brainwashes females into believing that they must obtain impossible-to-reach beauty standards that lower their self-esteem, and the desire to fulfill such standards can cause potentially life-threatening mental disorders such as depression, anorexia nervosa, and bulimia nervosa. Thousands of women pick up fashion magazines every day; these magazines are filled with images of thin women with smooth skin, symmetrical facial features, and hourglass figures. Models in magazines weigh twenty three percent less than the average healthy woman (Women’s Health, Taft College). Constant exposure to these photographs creates a new normal, and women often begin to believe that they must look similar to these models. Most women do not measure up to the standards set by the media, and as a result they feel upset and shameful over their own physique, no matter how healthy it is. Low self-esteem plagues millions of women and many of them are so affected that they sink into depression. Depression is an extremely serious mental illness that causes feelings of extreme sadness and drains all happiness from its victims. A recent study revealed that eleven percent of people suffer from depression before they turn eighteen (Depression in Children and Adolescents Fact Sheet, NIMH RSS). Because a majority of fashion magazines are directed toward women, females are much more prone to depression than males. In severe cases, depression may lead to suicide. The fact that t... ... middle of paper ... ...is not taken care of in time, bulimia nervosa can lead to kidney and esophagus issues that can be potentially fatal. Bulimia nervosa is yet another example of how once-healthy women who are surrounded by the media’s use of anatomically-impossible models eventually throw away their lives in the name of beauty. Unrealistic expectations of women set by the media create a new normal that women think they must fulfill. These beauty standards are nearly impossible to attain, so very few women succeed. Desperation fills those who do not achieve supermodel physiques and they fall victim to mental illnesses, such as depression, anorexia nervosa, and bulimia nervosa. If they are not properly treated in their early stages, these disorders can be fatal. If the media withdraws its use of atypically thin models, it can possibly save several thousand lives from untimely deaths.

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