Eating Disorders' relation to Body Image

[eatingdisorderandbodyimage]

11th Post - Reflection

After doing research, I have come to the conclusion that eating disorders and body image is a important issue that needs to be taken more seriously. Media needs to portraying false ideals of what women and mens bodies should look like. Everyone is different therefore there is no one perfect type of body because every one is built differently. People who go through eating disorders need professional help to help begin their recovery process. If they are not provided this, this issue can soon overtake them to the extent to becoming fatal to that particular person. 

Doing research on this topic was very useful because now I know not to compare myself to standards set by the media. The facts I gathered from the articles I read and real life example I studied, I came to the conclusion that this is in-fact a very serious issue that effects many adolescents and adults. Being more educated about this topic is one of the many solutions on how one should   go about slowly resolving this issue. 

[eatingdisorderandbodyimage]

10th Post - Annotated List of Additional Sources 

1) http://www.eatingdisorderhope.com/information/body-image

-This website provides you with information regarding negative and distorted body image, signs and symptoms of negative body image, causes of negative body image and etc. 

2) http://www.nedc.com.au/body-image

-Talks about body image, 4 aspects of body image, causes of body dissatisfaction and how to improve your body image etc.

3) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P65pajLA9io

- A short film about a girl named Keira who suffers from an eating disorder. 

4) https://www.womenshealth.gov/body-image/eating-disorders/

- General information about eating disorders.

5) http://nedic.ca/males’-body-image-and-eating-disorders-increasing-concern

-This website provides you with information regarding eating disorders that men face. Stories about men with body image issues and also statistics on how many men go through eating disorders. 

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9th Post - Your suggested solutions to the problem  

Some steps that can be taken to slowly alleviate this issue of eating disorders in relation to body image are: 

- Do not conform to Media’s appearance ideals. 

Try to stay away from media because often times media tends to promote unrealistic notions of what is considered beautiful. 

-Stay more body positive and try to love yourself for what you were born with. 

Staying body positive means you have to learn to love your body for what it is not try to try to change it because you feel that it doesn't compare to media set standards. 

-Do not compare yourself to unrealistic photoshopped pictures of celebrities.

-Seek professional help if you feel that you are developing a eating disorder due to stress to conform to society’s ideals. 

-Talk to someone, don't hide your issues or thoughts.

[eatingdisorderandbodyimage]

8th Post – Summary

The scholarly article, which I read for this project, provided a lot of base work for the research information I found. From doing research on eating disorders in relation to body image, I found that media plays a huge role in promoting a certain body type for men and women. Men are expected be muscular and feel the pressure when they have lack of muscles. Where as women feel the need to be lean and thin because of their constant obsession with having “fat” on their body. Having a thin lean figure is looked as being ideal. This can be due to how the models are portrayed as being tall and thin. This is not the best way to portray men or women because it can cause body dissatisfaction among them. Promoting a healthy and diverse body image is essential that way they men and women do not feel the pressure to conform to society’s unrealistic appearance ideals.

Eating disorders in relation to body image is a very important topic not only in the United Stated but also in countries such as Pakistan. In the second scholarly source that I used for this project, it talked about how Western way of living had migrated to countries such as Pakistan who’s women are now suffering from body image dissatisfaction and eating disorders as well. It also mentions how this problem effects the upper middle class females in Pakistan rather than other classes, it might be because they are more exposed to media set ideals and focus more on looking a certain way.

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7th Post – Description of how this problem is an intersectional issue

The issue of eating disorders in relation to body image is an intersectional issue because it affects people of different gender, race and class. Since everyone is exposed to media appearance ideals through TV, social media or magazines, negative body image is very common among people of different gender race and class. For example Serena Williams, a tennis player also talked her issues with body image and how body shaming that was done towards her really had an impact on her. She tried to not let it get to her and said she was really happy with her body but it is not okay for media to continue body shaming her. Everyone is built differently and that shouldn’t be the focus of media when it comes to celebrities but rather how hard they have worked. As celebrities are also people and can also be negatively affected by the constant body shaming from media. Serena William is an African American No. 1 women’s singles tennis player, yet she still faces such pressure from media about her body image.

[eatingdisorderandbodyimage]

6th Post- Discussion of Institutional Example 

For an institutional example, I looked into how college campus are affected when it come to helping students who have eating disorders. Often the pressure of school and living away from home are factors that to unhealthy eating habits and eventually developing eating disorders. Students go through stress and are unable to cope with social and academic pressure. Living away from home means often time they do not have time to cook a healthy mean due to school or if they have a job. Skipping meals or over eating can slowly develop into habits. This effects the institution because students in go through or develop mental health issue due to society’s pressure of appearance ideals and not having the time to manage a healthy lifestyle due to stress factors because of school.

Having counseling services for students is essential because often times not having the appropriate professional help for student who have developed eating disorders because of the body dissatisfaction can be fatal. With the appropriate services and help anyone with an eating disorder can get better and live a healthy long life. If they develop these issues with their body image, often times this can lead to their grades going down. Which can in all effect the institution all together if its students are not doing well. Therefore the right type of help must be kept available for students in universities.

        Also mental health institutions are also effected by the increase of eating disorders between people. This is because many who develop an eating disorder also are depressed or have other mental health issues that need to be treated. Since they are not at their highest peak mentally they are not able to remain strong to recover from their eating disorder without professional help.

[eatingdisorderandbodyimage]

5th Post - Discussion of Real example 

Demi Lovato, a former Disney actress has opened up about her eating disorder. I used her example for fifth post, which asks me to discuss a real life example. I have always admired Demi for her strength and attitude towards her past. She openly admitted before beginning her recovery process that she suffered from and eating disorder and body image dissatisfaction due to being called “fat” and ridiculed at a young age. Demi explains how being bulled at a young age about her weight affected her to the extent where she developed depressive thoughts and bulimia at the age of 12. MTV aired a documentary on Demi Lovato in March 2012, which addressed her main issues. Body image is how you think you look. Body esteem is the self-evaluation of there own body.

        Demi’s example was an inspiration for a lot of her fans that were suffering from the same issue. She gave them hope because she admitted to her mental health issues, because of which she developed her eating disorder and took initiative to go into rehab before she did something to hurt herself. She knew she was crashing while touring with the Jonas Brothers and eventually she had a nervous breakdown which led to her realizing that she needed professional help. After checking into a rehab facility, Demi discovered that she had was bipolar and due to this she also suffered from depression and suicidal thoughts and having and eating disorder on top of all of these issues just made it more dangerous for us to keep living like that without getting help. The pressure from her daily life kept her busy but the over load of work would also effect her negatively.

        Since Demi Lovato is a celebrity she has more access to help that she needed. Many people who suffer from eating disorders and body image dissatisfaction do not seek help. Eating disorders can be fatal to one’s health if they are not addressed with professional health. Being a celebrity was an advantage for her because she had a lot of people supporting her to get better and not to mention, she is also financially stable enough to seek the type a professional help she needed to start her recovery process.

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4th Post - Analyzing Second Scholarly Source  

This scholarly source talks about how media has impacted young females in Pakistan and developed many females to have an eating disorder.  While media is huge factor when it comes to promoting a certain type of appearance ideal, it is not the only cause to development of eating disorders and body dissatisfaction among men and women. Even though this source mainly talks about women in Pakistan who are from the upper middle class society, it also mentions how men aim to get a more muscular tone where as women want to be more lean. Eating disorders and negative body image is more common among women in the upper middle class society of Pakistan because they have access to media such as TV, magazines and etc. Pakistan has issues of poverty and malnutrition in the country over all so they socioeconomic positionality of the person being prone to mass media set ideals matters when it comes to developing a eating disorder.

        Since there is a lot of Westernization going on in Asian countries, the TV shows and products that the western countries want to advertise have made their way over there. By watching how flawless people look on TV, (often due to Photoshop techniques) people try to match up their bodies to those standards, which often impacts their eating habits. Western societies have brought about this dieting trend, which appeals to a lot females all around the world. The constant need to conform to society’s appearance ideals cause many adolescents and adults to have low self esteem, a negative body image, and depression. These can later lead to eating disorders such as anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa. The article states that up to 50% of the people who go through eating disorders because of body dissatisfaction do not recover. This can be due to not receiving the proper professional help.

        The article also mentions the many different cause of eating disorders, for example; biological, socio-cultural, psychological and family set standards or factors. A person’s personality can also be one of the main factors, which may cause eating disorders. According to this article, “Certain personality traits like: perfectionism, obsessiveness, approval-seeking, withdrawal, irritability, fear of becoming fat and black-or-white (all-or-nothing) thinking are also associated with eating disorders (Latif et. al, 125).” This quote describes how having these types of personality traits can play a huge role when developing an issue such as a eating disorder. Since adolescents spend up to 6 to 7 hours total a day engaging in some type of media outlet, it affects their brain.

        I thought this article was very informative because it provided a lot of information regarding the causes of eating disorders, the types of eating disorders, dieting trends and western impact on foreign countries, impacts of media images and etc. It touched on many different topics, which were helpful because it provided me with a lot of base work and facts for my research. I agreed with the factors listed in the article that lead up to eating disorders. Some questions the article should’ve addressed more thoroughly are point out more gender differences when it came to dissatisfied body image and developing eating disorders.

[eatingdisorderandbodyimage]

3rd Post - Analysis of Scholarly Source

       This scholarly source addresses how North America has put such a high emphasis on physical appearance. It compares how body image issues affect men and women. Both sexes are often found comparing their body to media set appearance ideals. Men and women both perceive their bodies differently. Men aim for a more muscular body where as women aim for a lean figure. The idea of body image is subjective, which means it depends on the viewpoint of an individual of how they perceive their body. People develop a negative body image when they compare themselves with the standards placed by the media. Body esteems is also another way to describe how one feels about their body (Brennan, 130). According to the sociocultural theory, mass media is a huge determinant on peoples self body image dissatisfaction. When we compare out bodies to people who are more attractive than us we often develop dissatisfaction towards our bodies.

        The study had made six hypotheses, which it tested out through out the research. The first three hypotheses were similar and predicted that women would experience body dissatisfaction more than men. This dissatisfaction with their bodies led to other issues like eating disorders, depression, low self-esteem and etc. Even though it is more common for women to feel self conscious about their bodies, men also feel this way. Women are more focused on how much fat they have gained and aim to have a slim figure where as the men feel self-conscious when they do not have a lot of muscle on their body. In order to conduct this study, they used the population of undergraduate university students from Canada. The sample population consisted of 197 students who were fluent in English and were enrolled in Psychology 100 courses. In order to get a general idea about the participants, they had to complete an online survey which asked them questions regarding their age, sex, native language, their height and their weight. The research was done using a variety of different questionnaires and scales. For example: Body Exposure During Sexual Activities Questionnaire (BESAQ), Body Image Quality of Life Inventory (BIQLI), The short form of the Situational Inventory of Body-Image Dysphoria (SIBID-S), Objectified Body Consciousness scale (OBS), Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale, Sociocultural Attitudes Towards Appearance Questionnaire-Revised version (SATAQ-R), and lastly Body Esteem Scale for Adolescents and Adults (BESAA).

        Since body dissatisfaction can have an effect on people during sexual interactions, the BESAQ measures how participants act and feel during this. The BIQLI measures to what extent people’s view of their own bodies’ affects their life. SIBID-S is used to determine the emotions that one goes through due to their negative body image. These two scales provide participants with situations in which they have to rate their answer from 0, which is (never) to 4, which is  (always and almost always). The OBS scale is one that uses three subscales such as: body surveillance, body shame, and appearance to measure the extent to which one objectifies their body. The Rosenberg scale measures self esteem. SATAQ-R is a scale that measures to what extent an individual conforms to society’s appearance ideals.  Finally BESAA scale uses three subscales as well: appearance, weight and attribution to measure body esteem which is, self-evaluation of one’s body.

        The results indicate, body image dissatisfaction is more common in women than in men. The study also finds media to have a muscular physique targets men more. I feel that this study did a very good job of analyzing all the different aspects that contribute to one’s body image dissatisfaction. In the future other studies should focus more closely on the particular gender differences and similarities about body image listed in this study.

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2nd Post - Web source

Media, Body Image, and Eating Disorders

https://www.nationaleatingdisorders.org/media-body-image-and-eating-disorders

 Media plays a huge role in how people perceive their body. When we see ideal images of celebrities on magazines, TV, social media and etc, we often naturally tend to compare ourselves with these media ideals. This web source describes how the amount of time children and adults spend engaging in media can be very harmful when it comes to having a negative idea of body image and/or body esteem.

This website states that media does contribute to dissatisfaction of body image which can eventually lead to eating disorders among young adults and adults. Kids grow up with the idea that being considered attractive means to be thin for women and muscular for men. Having a false idea of what is attractive can effect kids at a young age because as they grow up they will be self conscious about their body and their eating habits. They will develop self-scrutinizing attitudes, which can also negatively impact their eating habits.

        I agree with this web source that states the major role that society and media plays in developing extreme body image disturbance among people. I also agree that the foundation for the negative body image begins during childhood. When children are exposed to the media images at a young age they will grow up feeling dissatisfied with their bodies and eventually develop eating disorders or other body image disorders.