Anorexia In The Media

It is apparent that with the increasing popularity of social media today, there has been a shift in dietary changes within our society. Individuals are subconsciously changing how and what they eat. The question arises, why are so many young women dissatisfied with their bodies, despite their size? Although there are several forces believed to play a role in this dissatisfaction such as peer criticism and parental influences, the thin-ideal body is dominating the media (Grabe, Ward, & Hyde, 2008). Thinness is largely emphasized and praised for women in magazines, television shows, movies and commercials (Stice & Shaw, 1992). Anorexia Nervosa is an eating disorder that stems from this ubiquitous obsession to be thin and is often associated with a pathological fear of gaining weight, distorted self-body image and emaciation (The American Heritage® Science Dictionary).

According to the National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders, “the body type portrayed in advertising as the ideals is possessed naturally by only 5% of American females.” (“ANAD”) Body image has been a controversial theme because of the influence of the media. It is a widely known fact that eating disorder cases are on the rise. The concept of body image is a subjective matter. The common phrase, “Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder,” holds true meaning in this sense. One’s view and value of their body is self-imposed. Falling into the destructive eating disorders reveals much about a person’s psychological and emotional state. Examining the mental, physical, and emotional conditions behind recognized eating

Media has greatly evolved since starting, but has bad evolved with it? Print media, digital media, and now social media surround everybody today. Media surround us when we go to the store and see magazines, when we sit and home and watch TV, and especially when we go online. Over time, media has created its own idea of beauty. Medias influence on body image can’t be overlooked. Media and eating disorders have a cause and effect relationship. In Helens article, “Eating Disorders: A growing problem on college campuses”, she expresses that, “In today’s media-saturated world, young women are bombarded with one message: be thin” (Helen, 2014, Paragraph 9). Today media shows that to beautiful you have to be an unhealthy weight. If media doesn’t change its view of beautiful, then the rate of eating disorders triggered by media will go up. We need to figure out a way to help now.

The aim of this literature review is to describe the main causes of eating disorders among teenagers aged 12 to 18 years old in high schools globally, and to also explain to what extend do some of these causes influence eating disoders. Recent studies have indicated a major increase in the eating disorder habits and body dissatisfaction in adolescence over the past few decades. This crisis seems most prevalent in females`` than males with 20 percent high school females exhibiting poor eating habits and about 60 percent undergone weight loss attempt (Pritchard and Wilson, 2005). Most affected youngsters endeavor various solutions to cope with this dilemma and in most cases, drug and alcohol abuse and suicide are the worst

Picture the world controlled by the media. Could you imagine how ugly, scarce, and hateful it would be. What would you do if a magazine or a television show told you that your body weight had to be twenty pounds lighter to be all most perfect? Would you actually consider the fact or let ignore it? Teens, mainly girls, will be sucked into these magazines. (National Eating Disorders Info Centre 15) These could be magazines like Seventeen and Cosmo Girl. In addition with many others of course. All though, the media is a bad example at times it is not precisely the main issue for negative body image. (National Eating Disorders Association 1) All though, these constant screaming messages the media produces

Body image is “emotions regarding the aesthetic value and relative beauty of the person’s body (Airbrushing).”There has always been a standard flaunted by celebrities of the size zero Hollywood Thin. The average model is 5’11 and 110 pounds, while the average woman is 5’4 and 140 pounds (Unhealthy Picture). The perfect body has been shown to been an extremely thin woman with large breasts and small waist. A runway model is made to be like a hanger, with a straight, thin figure and plain face for the designer to put clothes on and make up to their liking. In magazines, the girls should be thin and beautiful. In fact, 80% of women say that women in magazines or on TV make them doubt themselves and make them feel insecure (Just Say Yes). But these

Poet Allen Ginsberg once said that “whoever controls the media-the images-controls the culture”, and nothing could be truer than this. Media plays a larger role in society within this generation more than many of us are aware of. It can easily impact people’s lives through aspects such as sports, fashion, movies or hobbies, but unfortunately, one of these impacts is how we view our body. Media constantly posts images and messages promoting a nearly unachievable and unrealistic image of what beauty looks like and it almost always has negative fallout when we struggle to meet this. This is known as an eating disorder. An eating disorder is a psychological sickness that results in dangerous eating habits and both short and long term affects on the body. People with eating disorders generally have a negative perception of their self will try to control their weight through unnecessary dieting, exercising or purging. But how does this illness begin? Social media sites, advertising, celebrities and other forms of media through society are all social pressures that are influencing people to be “perfect” and causing this expanding matter.

People who have Anorexia Nervosa have this fear of gaining weight so they result by not eating regularly or eat little amounts of food or not eating at all. People see themselves as being fat but instead they are skinny. “Anorexics usually strive for perfection” (www.mirror-mirror.org 1). So in doing this they feel like not eating anything can make them look perfect and have the body they want. “The lack of food can cause a person to become very thin, develop brittle hair and nails, dry skin, and a low pulse, become not able to stand the cold, and suffer from constipation and sometimes diarrhea” (Hendrick 3).

We live in a society ruled by the media. At every turn we’re bombarded with images of what a girl is supposed to look like, what she’s supposed to wear, and how she’s supposed to act. Models range from stick thin to plus size, with no representation of average size six girls to be found. All around the world, girls are starving themselves to look a certain way, with terms like “thigh gap” and “collarbones” running rampant in their minds. But why? What are those things really worth?

Symbolic Interactionism is a theory focusing on the approach that has evolved from social behaviorism and that stresses the symbolic nature of human interaction (p. 46). In society, there are norms and expectations that people are expected to follow and live by and trying to achieve this ideal self-image, people sometime behave in a self-destructing behavior. Because the media creates an image that we are suppose to fit, people will go to the extreme measures to meet this look even if it involves developing an eating disorder (DeGroat).

Eating disorders are mainly depicted through two different types of anorexia, restricting and bulimia. TV shows and movies show girls throwing and starving themselves to lose a few pounds. Media representation has created a stigma that people with anorexia nervosa have a choice. … In American Dad, Stan Smith – the main character – becomes anorexic after overreacting and comparing himself to an overweight individual. Throughout the episode we see Stan becoming fatter and fatter, until the middle of the episode where – in a plot twist – was Stan reveled to be imaging his sudden weight gain. At this point the audience could see that Stan was underweight. The rest of the episode showed Stan and another anorexic girl bonding through their need to lose

Media exposure creates an ideal body image that is not easily maintained by most adolescents and causes adolescents to be dissatisfied with their bodies and leads to unhealthy diet habits and other more sever eating disorders.

To begin, "Anorexia is an eating disorder that causes people to lose more weight than is considered healthy for their age and height." as said in the article "Anorexia" a Medline Plus article by Fred Berger. People with this eating disorder commonly have a large fear of gaining weight, even if they are underweight. Most that suffer with this illness usually diet

The topic I choose was types of eating disorders which is defined as a severe disturbances in eating behavior, such as unhealthy reduction of food intake or extreme overeating. The main types of eating disorders are anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa. (National Institutes of Health, 2015) These eating disorders can be caused by feelings of distress or concern about body shape or weight and they harm normal body composition and function. Eating disorders frequently develop during adolescence or early adulthood, but some reports indicate their onset can occur during childhood or later in adulthood (National Institutes of Health, 2015). There are many successful treatment plans involving medical care and monitoring, professional interventions,

The topic that I want to research for my final researched argument essay is the media influence on eating disorders focusing on children and adolescents. I want to explore, further expand, and support my argument stating that media does have an influence on eating disorders especially in children and adolescents using articles and reports to provide evidence and aid my thesis.