Eating Disorders: How the Media Have Influenced Their Development In Adolescent Girls :: Free Essays Online

Eating Disorders How the Media Have Influenced Their Development In Adolescent GirlsThe words corrode and boring are usually never found in the same sentence, but leave it to a supermodel to accomplish this task. Bodies reminiscent of the Holocaust clad entirely in a bathing suit, underwear, or a skimpy tank top flood popular fashion magazines today. How many times have you flipped through with(predicate) the pages of your favorite magazine and spotted an article about how women should have a good perception of themselves and how they should celebrate those curves, and then turned the page to find a centerfold makeover section complete with before and after pictures? Mass media serve as a type of normative influence to teens, and those who are high in susceptibility to the medias influence are much less skeptical of advertisements (Mangleburg & Bristol 30). Therefore, it is much more difficult for them to realize that attaining a body like those of the women in the above advertise ments is impossible without developing severely disordered eating habits. In the United States, the conservative estimates indicate that after puberty, 5-10% of girls and women are struggling with eating disorders. That translates to 5-10 one thousand thousand girls and women Out of that 5-10 million, at least 50,000 will die, and thats not including the number of cases not reported due to the shame and secretiveness associated with the disease (EDAP Handout- Basic Facts). Sufferers of eating disorders have admitted that images of skinny models enflamed their condition. In an article titled, War on Waifs, they agreed that they would like to see the fashion industry present a range of sizes in magazines just like you see in the stores (Jedeikin, sec. Responses). Susie Orbach, the therapist who treated the late Princess Diana for her bulimia, has similar thoughts on the controversyEating problems are now at pestilent proportions. There is so much anguish felt by so many women and gi rls of all ages, even in childhood We need to target the regimen industry. If diets worked, we wouldnt need so many of them I will also suggest that it is in the fashion industrys interest to glamourise girls and women in all sizes and shapes, as that is how we really are. Id like to see model agencies and designers setting aside profits for fashion students to promote gorgeous dress in all sizes (Jedeikin, sec. Responses).Until the industry can shift from encouraging people to be a shape which nature never intended them to be, however, the media will preserve to form young peoples view of the world, a world that is apparently populated by only thin girls.