Female Self-Image & Eating Disorders

Today women struggle to gain and then maintain a positive self-image, something that often seems as arduous as the tasks put to Hercules by the gods, for a number of factors in contemporary society work against the creation of a healthy sense of self for women. Many of these factors relate to women's physical appearance. Most women are told (either directly or more often implicitly in the images that they see in the mass media) that they must be beautiful to be truly feminine, that they should not feel good about themselves unless they meet socially agreed-to ideals of physical beauty.

Of course, it is simply not possible for most women to live up to the standards and patterns established by models and movie stars with drop-dead gorgeous bodies, flowing (usually blond) hair, a tiny waistline, very slightly curved hips, large breasts, and perfect facial features. The constant messages that women receive that they are not pretty enough (and therefore are not good enough) prompt many women into dramatic and sometimes even lethal assaults on their own bodies in an attempt to come closely to the socially espoused ideal and therefore (they hope) to find happiness. Sometimes these assaults take the form of plastic surgery to enlargen breasts or straighten noses or to make Asian eyes appear to be Caucasian. And sometimes they come in the form of eating disorders.

This paper examines some of the causes of eating disorders and the ways in which contemporary society pushes young women (

Related Essays

Negative Body Image & Eating Disorders .... fundamentally a reflection of our self-image and includes .... although people may continue to image themselves as .... is actually typical of the female population as a .... (4139 17 )

Image of Idealized Women in Female Advertising .... idealized body images of women in female advertising lead to increased body-image comparisons among women that often lead to negative self-assessment and .... (472 2 )

Eating Disorders and Self-Esteem .... Self-esteem, social pressure, body image, and competition anxiety, as risk factors were studied in 46 female university athletes. .... (9256 37 )

Body Image, Eating Disorders & Sports .... and Psychosoamtics looked at 75 female athletes recruited .... disorder marked by a distorted body image, than non .... athletes to engage in self-destructive, unhealthy .... (1032 4 )

Eating Disorders of the Adolescent Years .... in part to the fact that the ideal of female beauty promoted by .... tensions caused by new experiences and an uncertain or precarious self-image. .... Eating disorders. .... (1750 7 )

that many individuals experience and many girls and women (and some men) have complex and unhealthy relationships with food that stop short of anorexia or bulimia but are prompted by the same social factors (Lask and Byrant-Waugh, 1993, p. 17). Eating disorders are complex illnesses determined by a variety of risk factors that are not well understood but include: (a) the continuing media promotion of thinness as healthy and a sign of success; (b) perfectionism; (c) highly competitive environments that stress body thinness and high performance; (d) experiences of loss in personal relationships, such as family breakups or losses of family members; (e) a low sense of self-esteem (which in females is often induced by constant reinforcement by the mass media and acquaintances that they are less than physically perfect or fully desirable); and (f) heightened concern for appearance and body shape during adjustment to the physical changes of puberty (Lask and Bryant-Waugh, 1993, p. 25). Eating disorders are best seen as complex illnesses that reflect the interplay between biological, psychological, and social factors. But simply because their root causes are primarily cultural rather than physical does not in any way mean that their sev

Category: Psychology - F