Slimming the body: slimming ads, body dissatisfaction and eating disorders

Abstract

This study aimed to examine the perceived effects of media exposure of body slimming advertisements on body dissatisfaction and the tendency for eating disorders in a sample of adult women in Malaysia. This study examined two aspects: (a) the level of media exposure to slimming advertisements (media exposure), and (b) the tendency of respondents to make body comparisons with models in slimming advertisements (media body comparisons). Participants were 419 young women (18 – 39 years old) living in Kuala Lumpur. Correlation coefficients showed that media exposure and media body comparisons were positively associated with body dissatisfaction and eating disorders tendency. The findings suggest that mass media play a role by providing slim images that young women in Kuala Lumpur tend to emulate and adopt western cultural ideals of body image and the desire for a thinner body type.

Factors of body dissatisfaction among lebanese adolescents: the indirect effect of self-esteem between mental health and body dissatisfaction

“…Furthermore, this study showed an independent association between BD and the feeling of media/TV’s pressure to lose weight. Several studies are consistent with the current adolescent studies in Ghana [ 57 ], Malaysia [ 75 ], Jordan [ 17 ], Korea [ 76 ] Italy and France [ 77 ]. A study that took 299 girls (average age 19.9 years) and exposed them to false advertisements found that adolescents with initial BD reported higher BD after being exposed to images of ideally thin models over images of average-size models [ 77 ].…”