Lauren Schroepfer English 1102 02-13-14 Fast Draft Effects of Societys Standards of Beauty on Young Adults In todays society,

beauty is held at a high standard, but young adults find that hard to believe. Teens, specifically girls, look at models and think that their body needs to look like a models body, but that is far from the truth. Kasey Sedar writes Such standards of beauty are almost completely unattainable for most women; a majority of the models displayed on television and in advertisements are well below what is considered healthy body weight. Studies have found music television to be a powerful instigator of the social comparison process in young females. (westminstercollege) If only girls paid attention to some real role models for beauty, maybe they would stop being so concerned with their body image. There are plenty of people that try to help show women and teens what real beauty is, but often teens look over them because they think the real beauty is what is being displayed by society on billboards and television shows and magazines. In the United States extreme thinness is a social and cultural ideal, and women partially define themselves by how physically attractive they are. (Womens Health) With societys standards for beauty being so high, it becomes detrimental to womens health. Regardless of the actual size of their bodies, more than half of American female between ages ten and thirty are dieting says Jane Sprague Jones. That is a high percentage and especially with females starting at age ten. The office of Womens Health in the government states that the average American woman is 5 foot 4 inches tall and 140 pounds, and the average

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American model is 5 foot 11 inches tall and 117 pounds. The average American model is 7 inches taller, but still 23 pounds lighter! With society portraying model-like images to be what is normal and beautiful, the health of American women is doing to decrease. The office of Womens Health says that society associates thin with hard -working, beautiful, and selfdisciplined, and fat with lazy ugly and weak. The associations made by society are what pressure women to feel like they are not good enough and that they need to be thinner and maintain that image. Women who feel this kind of pressure sometimes go to extremes and end up hurting their bodies more than they think. People who starve themselves, or throw up after they eat being to get into the habit of doing it all the time, and it becomes an eating disorder that is hard to stop. Womens health says females are more likely than males to develop an eating disorder. Food is used to gain a feeling of control. With throwing up and even restraining oneself to eat, it is easier to feel more in control of your life because you are controlling your body. Although there is no single known cause of eating disorders, things like culture, personal characteristics, emotional disorders, stress, biology, and family can all contribute to the development of these disorders. (Womens Health) Females need to look at the positive role models. Dove is one example of a company who endorses beauty and self confidenceself-confidence. They have many beauty campaigns. The Dove Brand works to widen the definition of beauty. Through their advertisements, billboards, and other campaigning, The Dove Brand shows women of all races, shapes, sizes, with all different types of hair, eyes, and features and shows that they are all beautiful, which they are! More people need to pay attention to this kind of thing. The Dove Brand has also done a campaign called Dove Real Beauty Sketches. Women describe themselves to an artist and he draws them based on their description. Then another woman describes them and they compare
Comment [Ma2]: Possibly go into disabilities that restrict weight lose and body toning? Comment [Ma1]: Numbers need to be spelled out for MLA

the drawing with their description to the one with anothers description of themselves. The women look so much happier and brighter with the description from an outsider. Society has also changed throughout the decades. If you compare models from before to models now, you will see a big difference. Tyra Banks was a Victorias Secret Angel from 19972005. If you compare her to the Victorias Secret Angels that you see today, Tyra looks so much healthier.

But how are the Victorias Secret Angels chosen now? What is their critique? Is it by who is the skinniest? Girls should not want to be as skinny as the picture on the right. That even looks unhealthy. Some females think that men with only be attracted to skinny women, but that is not the truth either. Gentlemen like women who have curves too! Women can be pretty and skinny, but that does not mean that you have to look unhealthily skinny. Another thing that has changed throughout the decades that has an influence on young girls is the Barbie doll. Below is a picture of Barbie from the 1990s compared to Barbie from the 2000s.
Comment [Ma3]: great point on perspective

Why has society changed the way that the Barbie doll looks? If the look of Barbie changes, of course girls are going to be affected. Society has come up with this portrayal of beauty that is so obscure that it is sometimes impossible to get to that point. What is beauty? Is being beautiful really only about the outside appearance? That is what society says. Sure, outside appearance is important, but so is inner beauty. For outer beauty, being confident is beautiful. You do not have to be as skinny as a stick to be beautiful. That is the way society thinks. That causes a lot of self confidenceself-confidence problems with women, especially teenagers. When people see others who are super skinny and start to take that as what is normal, that is what they use as the standard to judge others. Speaking from personal experience, I have been around people who have judged others who do not deserve to be judged. They are called fat and chubby and ugly, but those judgments are completely un necessary. I have also been around some of the skinniest of people who thought they were fat. But why would someone skinny say they were fat? Because of the way society portrays beauty and sets its standards. Another form of beauty is being healthy. It is better to look healthy than to look so skinny that you look unhealthy, but some people do not understand what the difference is. What constitutes healthy? Healthy eating means consuming the right quantities of foods from all food groups in order to lead a healthy life (MedicalNewsToday)

Society has standards set for beauty that are so high that they are out of reach. The only way to reach those standards is if you are unhealthily skinny. Women need to understand that being healthy, confident, and comfortable with yourself is what is beautiful.