Liars and Self-Image of Our Bodies

The media plays a major role in the way our society sets certain standards and forms opinions. No matter where we go, the media is everywhere. The message that the media illustrates today is that “thin is in”. When was the last time you flipped through a magazine or through the television channels without seeing some type of advertisement promoting a new diet or new product being promoted by a super thin model or actress? Young girls are the main targets for new products. It is common for young girls to be obsessed with what is “in”. The message that young girls are getting from the media is that having bones sticking out is the way to look. They then become preoccupied with their bodies and self image. “ The exposure to ideal images coincides with a period in their lives where self regard and self efficacy is in decline, where body image is at its most fragile due to physical changes of puberty and where tendency for social comparison is at its peak” (www.eating-disorders.org.uk/docs/media.doc). The media illustrates to young girls an “idealized” shape which leads to being beautiful, popular, successful, and loved but which is not realistic to have unless you have the “idealized” shape. Therefore, they believe that their lives will be perfect as long as they are thin and have the “idealized” shape. The two main sources of media that reach young girls are television and magazines.

It takes a special kind of person to be completely comfortable with themselves, because we all have our insecurities no matter how insignificant they may be. Small lies are a common way for people to find some sort of connection with each other. For example, a person may lie about being interested in a certain type of activity in order to build some common ground or gain approval from someone. Even if the person lied in order to feel more accepted, they lack respect for themselves and for the other person because they aren’t happy with themselves, and therefore care about the other person’s opinion for all the wrong reasons. This lack of self respect often stems from more personal issues, characterized from lies by a person who cares little about themselves and focuses on what other people think of them. In order to be an honest person, it takes happiness and a strong sense of self-worth so that you are complacent with the person you really

We are told from a very young that we should tell the truth, and that lying is wrong; an immoral action which we should not engage in. Yet lying is a large part of daily life, whether it be our lying to others or others lying to us, around us, or lying in ways that affect our lives. Oftentimes, the lies we tell are for social gain; for the purposes of esteem, affection, or respect. We lie as a way to manage others impressions of us. Studies have found that women are generally more intimate in their interactions, which would suggest that they lie less. However, might women lie more to benefit others, as opposed to self-centered lies? A study by DePaul et al. (1996) set out to answers questions about the frequency of lying, types of lies told,

On top of this, 69% of girls in 5th-12th grade reported that magazine pictures and runway models influenced their idea of a perfect body shape (only 5% of the female population naturally has the body type portrayed as ideal in advertisement). This is obviously a problem because, growing up, girls everywhere are told that they’re pretty and that being pretty is the most important thing about them and they start basing their worth on their looks. But then, every single woman they see on TV, in movies, in magazines, any woman considered “hot” and “beautiful” doesn’t look like them anymore, which brings on deadly disorders like anorexia and bulumia that wreck the lives of young girls. Since 90% of people with eating disorders are women between the ages of 12 and 25, we should be asking ourselves “what is causing my child to develop destructive habits at such a young age?” The answer is that they’ve been told that the type of body

In her article, Peggy Orenstein touches on how females develop skewed body standards from the media and others around them at a young age. Parents start to worry about their daughter’s body image even if they fall within “the female body standards” based on how others may view them. Children as young as Kindergarten start to gain a sense of “fat phobia” meaning they are afraid of either becoming fat or fatter people. She also writes about ways parents can help combat the body expectations put on daughters, like stressing what a daughter’s body can do, praising accomplishments, getting her involved in a sports team, and volunteering. She incorporates the idea that to children, physical appearance is becoming more prevalent than ones’ characteristics. On page 3 of “Fear of Fatness,” Orenstein mentions how the phases of life are becoming blurred: girls are trying to look like adult women, and adult women are trying to look more like young girls. One of the last things that Orenstein makes clear in her article is that

Mass media can have an adverse effect teenage girls by showing body types that are unrealistic as the normal and desirable type of body to have. Young women look to the mass media to see the societal norms for beauty, and what they see can influence the way that they view themselves. By portraying women who possess a body type that is uncommon, it shows teenage girls that they need to change themselves to reflect the images they are shown. Portraying body types that emphasize thinness and exaggerated features, the mass media try to establish what is socially acceptable. Teenage girls who see this message feel pressured to become what they see, often not realizing that the body types portrayed in media are unrealistic.

Furthermore, media surrounds teenage girls in today’s culture. It is impossible to escape the sight of media. The media’s constant idealistic beauty is ever present to a vast amount of self-conscious girls. This image of beauty causes girls to have low self-esteem (Clay, Vignoles, and Dittmar). Media defining this perfect body image causes many adolescent girls to feel dissatisfied with their bodies and become depressed. “Viewing ultra-thin or average-size models led to decreases in both body satisfaction and self-esteem in adolescent girls aged eleven to sixteen, with changes in self-esteem fully mediated by changes in body satisfaction” (Clay, Vignoles, and Dittmar).

The subject of this article are young girls, mainly who are in their teenage years, but also the parents of teenage girls. However, anyone can be impacted and learn from this article. This article questions why society drills the idea of thinness into the minds of people, and every reader can take a different stance and have a different opinion on the issue. Some people may take a stance and say that individuals, themselves, are the only influence on their body image. However, others may take the stance and say that society, as a whole, has a huge influence on an individual and their body image. The author of this article, Erica Goode, includes many quotes from parents of teenage girls, who feel as if they need to go to extreme measures to fit in with society. In this case, the author is creating the stance that society plays a role when it comes to influencing an individual. Goode also provides many

According to the society/media’s beauty standards and expectations, women are supposed to have big breasts, small waist, and big butt as said in the interview by my sister. From a young age, girls are taught about what they are supposed to look like through media. All these girls grow up to be women who have low self-esteems because they have been shown pictures of women who they do not look like but want to look like. Women want to fit into these unrealistic images because they are eager to be known as beautiful. Studies show that the more reality television a young girl watches, the more likely she is to find physical appearance important (Thompson, 2014). Research shows that women who consume more mainstream media, place a greater importance on sexiness and overall appearance than those who do not consume as much (Mazur,

Unrealistic female body image is a widely discussed subject. Our culture portrays women as thin and beautiful. Having these qualities supposedly allows her to be wealthy, as well as successful. Thin, beautiful women are portrayed in movies, on television and in magazines. These expectations only lead to a woman having a poor body image. (Ettarh, R. 2009) Glamorized images of young women can attribute to low self-esteem in teenage girls. They are exposed to peer pressure every day. They are rated by their peers according to how they are dressed and if they are stylish, as well as thin. Models are tall and thin. The majority of teenage girls do not fit that description. Their bodies are still developing and changing. Older women also

Researchers have discovered that “ongoing exposure to certain ideas can shape and distort our perceptions on reality.” (Mintz 2007) Because young girls are subjected to a constant display of beautiful people in the media, they have developed a negative body image of themselves. Those who have a negative body image perceive their body as being unattractive or even hideous compared to others, while those with a positive body image will see themselves as attractive, or will at least accept themselves and be comfortable in their own skin. During adolescence, negative body image is especially harmful because of the quick changes both physically and mentally occurring during puberty. Also, young girls are becoming more and more exposed to the media and the media keeps getting more and more provocative. Young girls are looking to women with unrealistic body shapes as role models. It’s hard to find, in today’s media, a “normal” looking

Our tweens and early teens are a time when children become more aware of celebrities and media images — as well as how other kids look and how they fit in. Girls and boys might start to compare themselves with other people or media images. All of this can affect how they feel about themselves and their bodies even as they grow into young adults. When the kids grow into young adults, they get social media, they have all these sources to media. They see all these people with the body thats perfect. In their eyes, they are not perfect. They are not accepted. They are not good enough. What they are wanting is to be accepted and wanted and good enough. So the young women look up all these at home workouts and healthy food. All these young men hit the gym and pre workout.

This might, among self-deception, which is mentioned in the Vazier and Calson article (2010, p. 611) be a reason for why some people perceive themselves to be one way, and those around them perceive them to be another. I believe this applies to the real world, because many people perceive themselves to be the best person to determine their true nature in regards to self-knowledge. This article relates to real life, in particular that the way people measured themselves in regards to behavior, did not vary much from how people acted within a laboratory setting, indicating that behavior is something that people have a relatively strong understanding of. Another set of findings indicates that some studies indicate that people are able to accurately describe their personality, while in other studies, those who know that person best do not agree with how that person perceived himself or herself to be (Vazier & Calson, 2010, p. 613). This can relate to real life, in that people can believe one thing about themself, yet may be perceived an entirely different way from the people around them. I believe this to be true in real life, because as previously mentioned, there are possibly various actions and mannerisms we engage in that we are not entirely

Along with the media, other factors can also impact the way young girls and women feel about their body, which can lead to unhealthy weight concerns and eating patterns. Struggles with self-esteem, peer pressure to look a certain way, having mothers concerned about their own weight, and natural healthy weight gain and body changes during puberty are some of the factors that can influence a women's body image. Young girls aren't aware that body changes during puberty are normal and healthy, not every girl is going to look the same when these changes start happening. When young girls get too concerned about their

The idea of an idea woman has been thin for a very long time. According to the society, being thin means being happy, successful and appealing. Most of the models/actors that media portrays as ‘beautiful’ are thin women and not at all like the women we see every day. They represent images of women that most of the society cannot attain. These models are shown as almost close to perfection, with all the styling, make-up and airbrushing techniques to hide any flaws. Woman who are constantly exposed to such messages of beauty, might end up feeling dissatisfied of themselves. According to Berg 2000, girls as young as two are exposed to media that portrays thin women as successful. They see their aunts, mothers and sisters battling to achieve the perfect body, which is thin. This over time has an impression on the minds on the children.