The Constant Influence of the Media and Advertisements on People's Body - Term Paper Example

Advertisement and Body Image Introduction Body image is an essential part of our self-concept and identity. It influences our thoughts, feelings, behaviors and future goals. Negative body image results from a discrepancy between a persons current and ideal body (Bedford, 46). The media bombards the public with images of thin women. Everywhere you look you can see advertisements that clearly define our cultural ideal for the female body. Thin, young women are featured on the television shows we watch, the billboards we drive by on our way to work, and the covers of the glossy magazines we read. Super models and celebrities are held on a pedestal as the ideal woman. Body image can be defined as an individual subjective concept of his or her physical appearance. Body image involves both a perceptual and attitudinal element. The self-perceptual component consists of what an individual sees or thinks in body size, shape, and appearance. A disturbance in the perceptual element of body image is generally reflected in a distorted perception of body size, shape, and appearance. The attitudinal component reflects how we feel about those attributes and how the feelings motivate certain behavior. Disturbances in the attitudinal element usually result in dissatisfaction with body appearance. Perceptions about body images are shaped from a variety of experiences and begin to develop in early childhood. Overall body size and image concerns have been reported to be more prevalent among females than males. Gender related differences in acceptable body size are shaped from a variety of societal definitions of appealing shapes for males and females. In the U.S about 10% of girls and women are anguish from detected ingestion disorders. Of these at least fifty thousand will die as a result (Posovac, 187). While intake disorders take lives and significantly crash the health and well being of victims. As we look additional into it more pictures appear, 80% of women are miserable with their appearance. Advertisement and Body image The media is efficiently fanatical as billions are spent on items like makeup, new diet and clothing. This smartening territory is dependent on our disempowerment. They count on us buying into their mythology and misrepresentations. We will never fit what they consider beautiful, we can never be happy, the damage to our self-esteem is endless, and the body hatred created is disturbing. By examining how these images have impacted our life you are better prepared to avoid falling victim to these myths. Both men and women have to learn to measure themselves by meaningful qualities that are a far greater value and are far more beautiful than any image on TV or on a movie screen. The consequences of hating our and the serious issue of eating disorders are far too significant and cant only be pointed at the media. Eating disorders are complex and involved complex interactions of psychological, biological and sociological factors and do require help fro a professional. Eating disorders and body hatred impact the lives of millions of men and women. It is not only women that buy into these myths and it is not only women that suffer with these illnesses. Eating disorders are life threatening and could happen to anyone. Girls are overly concerned about weight and body shape. They strive for the "perfect" body and judging themselves by their looks, appearance, and above all thinness. But boys dont escape either. They are worried with the size and power of their body. There has been a transform in the male body image. The advertisements on media are the main part. Surrounded by thin models and TV stars, teenage girls are taught to achieve an impossible goal. As a result, many teenage girls intensely dislike their bodies and can tell you down to the smallest detail whats wrong with their body. Most teenagers watch a lot of TV in the week and are flooded with images of fat-free bodies in fashion and teen magazines. A female should look like Barbie, and a male should look like Arnold Schwarzenegger. Buff Baywatch lifeguards, the well-toned abs of any cast member of Friends, and girls in music videos dont help either. Twenty-four percent of women and 17 percent of men say they would give up more than three years of life to be thinner (Harrison, 255). The images of men and women today in ads dont promote self-esteem or positive self-image. Theyre intended to sell products. In the U.S. billions of dollars are spent by customers who pursue the perfect body. The message thin is in, is sold thousands of times in a day through TV, movies, magazines, billboards, newspapers and songs. Advertisement and Society Society has internalized the medias obsession with appearance. If women do not live up to societys unrealistic beauty standards, they are left feeling critical of their own bodies and inadequate as women. Society has bought into the medias advertisements. Women and the men spend their time and money trying to become the flawless images they see on the television screens. The media is responsible for people unhealthy relationship with their bodies because advertisements emphasize the importance of external beauty over all else. Societys obsession with thin is a direct product of the media. It was not until the past 50 years that thin became the ideal form of a womans body. Societys definition of beauty has changed throughout history. Today, women are obsessing over the appearance of their bodies at an earlier age than ever. Advertisements for Barbie Dolls, pop singers, and clothing brands aimed towards children and preteens all send a negative message to young girls. From the time a girl is able to watch a television program, different advertisements or flip through a magazine she is bombarded with images of thin women. As girls grow up into women, they become more conscious of their bodies. Worrying about weight and appearance becomes natural. It gets to the point where many women cant remember a time when they didnt compare themselves to thin, beautiful celebrities and super models. It is not natural to hate your body (Thomas, 95). The media has infiltrated womens subconscious and altered the way that they evaluate themselves as a person. The constant influence of the media and advertisements make men and women feel like they are always being observed by the people around them. In reality, the only person who is watching and judging them is themselves. There is no longer a need for an outside force. In order to make a profit, the media has taken advantage of our need to be accepted by society. Women are told that, for the right price, they can come one step closer to perfection. The advertisement has become such an intricate part of our society and culture that the messages it sends us have become our own. Women have internalized the advertisements messages about beauty and gender to the point that they believe the medias messages as their own ideas. Thin women are portrayed in the advertisements so often that society has begun to believe that women should and can meet this ideal. The media tells us that being extremely thin is not only possible, but it is right way for a womans body to look. In reality, only a small portion of the population is capable of achieving the super model body that is so common on television and in movies. Being thin and beautiful is portrayed as normal and natural. The media repeatedly tells us that if you look in the mirror and see anything other than perfection you are abnormal. An entire industry has been created to help men and women reform themselves to meet societys ideal of physical beauty. The diet industry is constantly convincing women that they need to lose weight in order to be happy. To make a profit, the treadmill manufacturers and diet pill companies must first convince the consumer that they need to be changed. They use their advertisements to show women that they are inadequate and with the help of their product they are capable of being so much more. Three-quarters of women, of all ages, have a negative body image (Holmstrom, 198). The media is controlling women with discipline. Most people are not aware of the effect the media is having on their daily routine. The result of the medias negative body image propaganda is that most people today have a very complicated relationship with food. History Views about men and women go way back on how they are portrayed in the media; we must look at the progression of it in history. The historical perspective deals with how people have been portrayed in the advertisements in media throughout history. Historians may look at these results and say that the way that men and women in the media have been presented has changed throughout the decades and this has an effect on young people. In the past, women have been portrayed as wholesome and naturally beautiful (Patricia, 400). In recent times, there is a lot of thinness-depicting as well as thinness- promoting media. Consequently women trying to attain these unrealistic body images portrayed by the advertisements often engage in dangerous methods to lose weight or maintain their weight to achieve this desired slimness (Brewis, 549). There has been a large marketing of body images through media in recent times and this has been a large factor in creating todays perception of the tall, thin and toned ideal for women. This, along with fashion magazine advertisements is found to produce a negative body image among youngsters. Rabak-Wagener, Eickhoff-Shemek and Kelly-Vance (p. 33), found that 70% of the teenage females who read fashion magazines think that they are good sources for beauty and fitness information, which they actually are not. Women are using women in the media as people to compare themselves to, but since women in the media are not accurate portrayals, womens body images of themselves are very low. A study done to examine the relationship between media and its advertisement exposure and body satisfaction levels show that women exposed to thinness-promoting media have a lower body satisfaction levels (Posovac, 190). The medias representation of weight, beauty, and hunger extends beyond mere food. Gender roles are defined through advertisements. Women are depicted as nurturing, passive, and emotional. Their role is to care for children, prepare food, and remain passive to their husbands. Cultural roles of men and women are not natural. They are imposed by strong social structures. The media plays a key role in defining gender roles in American society. Women believe that their duty as a woman is to live up to the medias images of caring housewives and gorgeous trophy wives. Rather than accepting individuals for their inner beauty, value is placed on living up to a standard that does not fit every woman, if any. Hunger is used by the media as a form of social control (Bessenoff, 250). Constantly keeping women preoccupied with their weight prevents them from focusing on other aspects of their lives. From an early age, the media teaches women that their purpose is to attain beauty rather than create change in the world. Teaching women to be passive keeps them from achieving real goals. Taking a step back to evaluate the medias impact on men and women body image is difficult to do because it has become an intricate part of our society. The media sends nonstop messages about both gender’s bodies and the way they should and can look. It is undeniable that the blatant images and subliminal messages in advertisements are having a negative effect on the way people look at themselves and their bodies. The ideal body shape that is portrayed in the media does not match the average womans body. This causes personal dissatisfaction with ones body and often leads to dieting and exercise. A poor sense of body image also leads to more dangerous habits such as abusing laxatives, vomiting after eating and restrictive food intake. The most important effect that the media is having on person is what it is taking away from them. People are focusing on improving their bodies rather than their minds. It is crucial that people take back their ideal self image. Advertisers can not be trusted to define beauty standards because their goal is to create an unattainable vision of beauty. Sociology From a sociological point of view, gender is socially constructed and it is only the media who shows women as thin, petite and beautiful. In reality this is not necessarily true and therefore it is only the media that is influencing young women (Crane, 545). While examining ideal body proportions of women, women wanted a smaller waist than they had, as well as smaller hips. They also wanted a medium sized bust instead of a larger one because it results in an all over smaller figure (Harrison, 258). The media has defined the ideal female as being thinner than that of an actual healthy woman, but it has also defined the ideal female as being young. As a result, there is now a tendency to devalue older women. This tendency is most leading in advanced industrial societies where women have made the most progress, because it is in these societies that the media and advertising industries are very large, and the media sends a message that only young women are beautiful (Inglehart, 399). Social comparison is a major factor that influences ones body image. Social comparison means the judgments that people form about their own attributes compared to the attributes of others. The relationship between social comparison and body image for college aged females has been widely studied. Most results have shown that those who have more appearance-based social comparisons are more likely to be dissatisfied with their body images. Results also suggest that the connection between negative body images and social comparison may be influenced by media because the main aim of appearance comparisons are the models and celebrities presented in the media (Jones, 650). Conclusion Research has shown that womans self-images are more vulnerable, which leads to the chance of womens body satisfaction level to be lower. Due to the inaccuracy of the portrayal of women in the media compared to that of an average healthy woman, women are trying to achieve an ideal that is very hard to attain. This leads to body-dissatisfaction and may also lead to eating disorders. This shows that a womans self image can be lowered by exposure to women in the media. It is mainly women who idolize women in the advertisements because they want to become like them, even though they are not an accurate representation of the average person (Harrison, 261). In my opinion, the only reason why thin and beautiful women are chosen is because it is what attracts our attention. We are brought up to judge a womans appearance; therefore if a woman in an advertisement is not very attractive or over weight, its most certain that she would not gain the same attention as an attractive woman. Just because a woman doesnt have a perfect face or figure that she should still is given the time of day and the respect that every person deserves. Everyone was created differently and for that reason nobody is perfect. Society is fixated on pressuring women into becoming the ideal "Barbie figure" which is extremely unfair and is a mentality that must be changed. Its important to do research on this topic because we must come to a conclusion on why women feel as if they need to be perfect, to feel accepted. Fashion advertisements have been found to have a negative effect on body image attitudes and behaviors among American women. 70 percent of the teenage women who regularly read fashion magazines consider the magazines an important source of beauty information. The portrayal of ideal female bodes in fashion magazines has an influence on body image distortion, which is a feature of disturbed eating pathologies. Almost everyone has, at one time or another, wished they could change something about themselves. For many people, the desire to change involves something about their physical appearance. Body image is something that influences everyone. Body image affects people of all ages, both males and females. However, in the United States females are in particular, more conscious about looking good. In many cases, appearance becomes more important to the female than one health and well being. The media has been responsible for promoting a standard of beauty that in most cases is unattainable to many women and unhealthy to most people. However, due to the effect of poor body image influenced by several factors women fall prey to this cultural ideal of thinness. The impact that the media has on women body image is generally poor and often detrimental to their perception of their body image. This poor perception can cause several vulnerabilities in woman including the need to create poor eating pathologies to achieve this ideal. References Bedford, Jennifer L. and Johnson, C. Shanthi. 2006. "Societal Influences on Body Image Dissatisfaction in Younger and Older Women." Journal of Women and Aging. 18; 41-55. Bessenoff, Gayle R. 2006. "Can the Media Effect Us? Social Comparison, Self-Discrepency, and the Thin Ideal." Psychology of Women Quarterly. 30; 239-251. Brewis, A.A. (1999). The accuracy of attractive-body-size judgment. Current Anthropology, 40(4), 548 - 556. Crane, D. (1999). Gender and hegemony in fashion magazines: Womens interpretations of fashion photographs. The Sociological Quarterly, 40(4), 541-550. Harrison, K. (2003). Television viewers ideal body proportions: The case of the curvaceously thin woman. Sex Roles: A Journal of Research, 48 (5-6), 255-264. Holmstrom, Amanda J. 2004. "The Effects of Media on Body Image: A Meta-Analysis." 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