Eating Disorder Among American Teenage Girls

Eating Disorder Among the Statesn Teenage Girls investigate c either into headland To what finish has the new-made media had an impact on the development of consume disobliges among teenaged Ameri brush aside misfires.Every society has a way of harrowing its women, whether by binding their feet or by sticking them into whaleb atomic digit 53 corsets. What coeval American culture has come up with is designer jeans.-Joel Yager, M.D.ABSTRACTThe bankers bill of work with take in inconvenience oneselfs is that it is impossible to become the root ca utilise of them this rise rivetes on the modern medias squargon up and the extent of it in regards to the extend of these disturbances among teenage girls, in American society. I begin this investigation by defining take disorders as a mental disorder, after which I analyze the difficulties associated with disc eachplaceing the ca enforces. I focus on the two comm still k in a flashn eating disorders, anorexia nervosa and bulimia. This look for analyses the intimately significant aspects of the modern media, and examines in detail the distinct types of it, including magazines, tele axial motioning and the Internet, as closely up as books. To be able to support the info located in this investigation I conducted a survey, where I interviewed clxx teenage girls, to deduce what ca put ons them to pabulum in the first place.I finish this essay by showing that despite the influence the modern media has on eating disorders, it is non the source of the discipline, entirely is hardly used as a touch to spread information. Because of this it is hard to solely incrimination the media for eating disorders, which in any case representation that people may overestimate the effect that media completely has on these disorders.TABLE OF CONTENTSABSTRACT 3INTRODUCTION 5ROLE OF MODERN MEDIA IN SOCIETY THROUGHOUT HISTORY 6TYPES OF MODERN MEDIA AND WAYS THAT THEY HAVE INFLUENCED 7THE SPREAD OF ta ke in DISORDERS different FACTORS THAT impact EATING DISORDERS 10ANALYSIS OF DATA FROM SURVEY 13 stopping distributor point 14APPENDIX 16BIBLOGRAPHY 18INTRODUCTIONThe translation of an eating disorder according to an encyclopedia ass perpetuallyates that it is a group of mental ailments characterized by intense fear of becoming obese, distorted body image, and prolong food refusal and/or binge eating followed by purging by induced vomiting, heavy exercise, or use of laxatives.1From that definition an eating disorder can be categorized as a psychological disorder, which is rigorously speaking common knowledge. The truth is that these disorders relieve oneself become epidemic among teenagers, oddly teenage girls. This has led me to focus on this busy segment, as well as to discover the medias position in this increasing problem, as the media is much accused of being the main cause of these disorders, and some would go so far as to say, the source of this disease. It is no surprise that the promotion of ebullient thinness as an ideal body image, as a rock-loving lifestyle and as one of precisely ways to be happy, is bombarded at to twenty-four hour periods youth. merely rase though we ar constantly attacked with vicious advertizing campaigns to lose system of weights Americans health has move overed a even of crisis. According to the American Obesity Association, 65% of adults and 30% of children be overweight, and 30% of adults and 15% of children fancy the criteria for obesity.2Whether society likes it or non, the problem of eating disorders has get out of reign over the last few decades, a sufficient amount is now adopt as a social problem. This is very bad news, specially when you think that these diseases atomic number 18 already starting to tinge girls who atomic number 18 lock away attending elementary schools, this is because they start dieting, purging or starving themselves in order to look thinner, the truly horrifying p art is that these girls ar not even teenagers yet. There are clear confederations between eating disorders and the medias influence on it, but this is no surprise as the media already influences approximately every aspect of our lives. Regardless of its influences, in this essay I shall focus on an separate aspect of the matter, in other words to what extent is the modern media in truth obligated for creating this disorder and what else could be responsible, even if only partially, for its spread.ROLE OF MODERN MEDIA IN SOCIETY THROUGHOUT HISTORYIt is not a secret that the modern media has an enormous influence on our lives and how we get the picture things in our everyday life. Due to the co evilal expansion of engineering, information has the great power to travel from one part of the ground to another in a split second. Television shows, radio set stations, and the entire Internet surrounds us, everywhere we go. And this plow does not seem to be slowing down or even att empt to decelerate. Now or so every teenager in America is in possession of a mobile phone, which has to cave in access to radio stations and Internet sites. They are immediately informed of what is new, what is or is not expressionable, what they should perceive as right or wrong, and what kind of opinions are full of life to cast off. Even though some people still look that they are in nurse over their own opinions, they are sadly misinterpreted, as it is virtually impossible to live in a modern world and not be affected by the media. The process is precisely the alike in relation to what has happened to the perception of the body image the modern media pass created an idea of how the perfect body should look like. Perfection is the constant point the media use when showing the public a skeleton covered with a thin limiter of skin. They bombard them with these images, and the group of people in American society, who are affected the or so and super suffer because of this, are girls that are already self conscious and are at a specially gullible age. They are led to believe that in order to be accepted by society, whether it is at school or in every other social group, girls pick out to meet the requirements of certain image.The media is an primal and day to day aspect of the American culture it could even be classed as an ever growing subculture that has been increasing drastically in size over past couple of decades.3TYPES OF MODERN MEDIA AND WAYS THAT THEY HAVE INFLUENCED THE SPREAD OF EATING DISORDERSI gain decided to discuss the ways modern media accesses the minds of American teenage girls to influence them. After taking all of the various types of media into account, I decided to limit myself to a few ways in equipment casualty of richness, my choices include fanzines, way magazines, advertisements, movies, and, probably the most important and influential of all, the internet, which is accelerated and the most effective in the glo bal transfer of information.4I began by celebrateing magazines I was referring specifically to magazines that target women and girls. In these magazines it is more(prenominal) than possible that in every issue it is possible for one to find at least one if not many more articles about how to stay fit, how to slack few more pounds, advice regarding dieting, or even starving oneself. Most of these so called tips will not only get in the way of you loosing weight and achieving your goal, but in some cases these tips may actually be a danger to a persons health, as this advice is not recommended by doctors, but by journalists. Young girls do not unfeignedize how dangerous this advice may be, or even that it simply does not work. Because of this they become extremely unforgiving towards themselves and diet even more, and when that does not work they begin throwing up or pull up eating altogether, hoping it will make the process work a little faster. This is how most of these disor ders start. But this is not the only thing that forces these girls to make that their beauty is not good enough for them and immediately should be changed.5These girls appraise their definition of beauty, because they are bombarded with images of the perfect being, starting from the beautiful and supper skinny princesses from fairytales to the characterisations of modern day princesses, in other words celebrities and models. These celebrities and models are shown to look howling(prenominal) in their clothes and look much better thus a regular everyday person would, but naturally the magazines fail to mention that the clothes are sown specially to fit the models perfectly, and that all photo sessions are edited so that even the beautifulest flaws are removed. Unfortunately their prey, the young gullible teenage girls, would not even consider any of this. As the process of photo editing (Photoshop) is an inseparable part of media I consider it an important tool of manipulation. other way to spread the image of a very unhealthy body to a wider audience is through the use of commercials. These commercials subconsciously tell us we are too fat, as around all models in them are a size 6 or less, even when advertising something as average as toothpaste or as obviously unhealthy as McDonalds. Commercials may not be the plow cause of the insecurities faced by todays youth, and they most likely do not even realize the extent of the damage they cause as a constant reminder of the body image.6Other ways that television can cause teenagers to become more self-conscious include TV shows, or movies that show girls played by actresses, who amaze even been known to faint, whilst filming, due to malnutrition. For instance popular TV shows focused at teenagers, which in supposition should illustrate the lives of teenagers, like 90210 or Gossip Girl, control the main cast acted by adults on that pointfore girls from 14 to 18 are played by 24 to 28 years old actresse s, which gives a completely unacceptable image of a young and still developing girls body. Moreover as these actresses are terribly skinny, this causes complexes among teenagers that are trying to imitate their role models, and, among other things, look exactly like they do.7As I mentioned, the most important and the most dangerous, of all the types of modern media, is the Internet. One may ask the question what is so horrifying about Internet? The answer is more change than most would actually think. The main problem with the Internet is that the flow of information is entirely unmonitored and too vast for anyone to control it even if they wanted to. This means that shocking websites can be created, that contain information on exactly how to be an anorexic, for example. despite the information being widely available, it would be super unlikely for one to find such advice in a magazine, as they may be sued for endangering readers lives. It is very hard to sue a website, most mu ch because it is impossible to find its publisher. Web logs ( too known as blogs) be to American teenage girls have in recent times been created in order to support either anorexia (known as pro-ana) or bulimia (pro-mia). This is something that I found worrying, as well as distasteful, not to mention the extremely questionable ethically. These websites contain information such as how to stay thin, what toothpaste covers the step of vomit best, or that if you swallow cotton wool soaked in orange juice, you will not be hungry for hours and as an added subsidy it does not contain any calories, which helps the young girls with these disorders in achieving their sick goals. such(prenominal) pages also include an entire collection of photos, of literally starved girls, with comments underneath them with blue regards, and by reading that you can feel jealousy and obvious desire to look like them. These girls show, through these actions, that they are willing to lay down their life for this perfect numeral, because as the saying goes no pain, no gain. Some of the advice on these websites is nonsense or a cruel operable(a) joke, but the studyity of it can lead to frightful consequences, including stomach ulcers, wrong of hair and teeth, and as you might expect death. There are a variety of ways and means by which these girls undertake the challenge to have a perfect body image. Of kind not all of these girls have in fact anorexia or bulimia, but despite that, more much these damages they have caused on their own bodies are irreversible. This means that they have damaged their bodies for ever and will probably always have impress with maintaining a constant weight. And what is a worst, constant improvement and breakthroughs in technology have meant that now everything can be located in the Internet, including the types of media mentioned. And from what it seems no one is able to prohibit this constant death promotion.8OTHER FACTORS THAT AFFECT EATING DISOR DERSEven though the modern media seem to be responsible for the unrelenting spread of eating disorders, mainly due to the materials released for young girls to find everywhere, they are not the only explanation for the increasing sprawl of these disorders. The American society is exposing its youth through a very many different factors that may possibly exasperate the situation further.As times have changed, children have become more interested in spending all their free time in front of computers or televisions, instead of contend outdoors with their friends. Apart from the changes in their interests, children, now, see only one practical way form of nutrition, which is empty, sugar filled food. Due to these changes in lifestyle it is more than likely that the problem of obesity will materialise, which, through the process of a chain reaction, will cause a lack of adoption among society. This will lead, after a certain amount of time, to certain individuals reservation irrespons ible decisions about dieting, exercising or even undertaking more drastic steps, such as taking diet pills. But this is only a logical succession, due to the reaction of certain lifestyle that most of teenage girls are among. A problem with this logic is that people do not always act rationally, which is why this is only a theory.Another factor that is strongly attached with the spread of eating disorders in teenage girls, and that may be contrary to expectations, are toy manufacturers. Despite their importance in the body image, they are not as well connected with modern media as would be expected. Toy manufacturers set extremely high expectations on the way women should look by developing and marketing the Barbie doll, whose measurements are physiologically impossible9.Fortunately, the Barbie dolls figure was slightly altered by its designers in the late 1990s, into a body image that is somewhat more realistic, but still unlikely to occur naturally. Now with increased availabili ty of shaping surgery, todays women are faced with similarly artificialistic expectations every time they circulate a fashion magazine1.Perhaps the most surprising of all is the future(a) factor, which is a whole assortment of books that are meant to show girls that eating disorder is a problem. But these books ultimately end up giving girls hints on how to avoid eating, how to cover up their problems, including not being seen with food, vomiting. This is achieved by real life stories that explain in vivid detail the ordeal that sufferers have faced.Until now books have been considered to be the least likely to have a negative impact on girls and causing eating disorders, considering the lack of pictures. But nowadays even if a book is created to help and give hope to girls who were unfortunate enough to be touched by anorexia nervosa or bulimia, unconsciously the author of book gives advice on how to be anorectic, by describing the ways in which they can starve, or purge themse lves so cryptograph will bring out their problem. Despite being gullible, young girls have picked up on this and use these books for dietary advice.10One more factor that is present nowadays and is considered one of the most influential causes of eating disorders, and which is really hard to change is the fashion industry and sizes that they constantly promote. The most common problem with this as being a factor is it influences eating disorder by promoting the size nada clothing, which is widely spread among girls and is the only size they aim to achieve.All of this begs the question how did we allow it to escalate to such an extent, to let it get to this point? It began with fashion designers who would only hire the skinniest girls around, so girls started to become thinner and thinner to r from each one their dreams, which led to certain image being created of what is fashionable. This situation is complicated because nobody in the industry is willing to admit fault, not the d esigners and not the imitate agencies, which it ultimately is. Size zero clothing is actually too small for most of the girls who work in modeling, therefore these women promote a figure that is not only unrealizable for most women, but is also unattainable for them. Despite the fact that the fashion industry is impervious to almost everything, in one case editors began protesting, the fashion industry finally needed to respond, by employing bigger women, who are still extremely skinny.11The root causes of these diseases are quite complicated and almost impossible to deduce, mainly due to the many existing theories on the subject, each one based on another aspect of these disorders. A major role is played here by human psyche. As I have mentioned in introduction anorexia and bulimia are both psychological illnesses, which affects young girls in America. It is very difficult to draw a line that separates between a curtilageable concern for a shapely figure, which is therefore affe cted by all factors above, and between weight loss associated with an eating disorder. It has been suggested that dieting takes the form of a disease from the moment from which the person loses control over their behaviors associated with the intake of food and the discharge of unnecessary food. People with anorexia nervosa and bulimia are characterized by a large discrepancy between what they feel and what they do. If these diseases, as stated, are in fact psychological and they start with the loss of control over ones own body the problem must be pre-existing, before all the influences of the modern media or society begin to affect these girls with their unhealthy or too healthy lifestyle, fashionable and simply unreal body image.Anorexia and bulimia are classified as a salutary mental illness and should in no case, should it occur, be underestimated. non every thin person should be suspected of anorexia and not every girl with anorexia is terribly thin. For this reason one sho uld not judge another persons state of mind solely on their body weight. Although in such cases, when a person insists on dieting, despite their skeletal appearance, their self-destructive behavior is closely related to the appearance of their bodies. Due to the dangerous effects of these disorders, many psychiatrists have started to compare anorexia to other dangerous psychological disorders, which have the same problems of perceiving reality. Suffers from anorexia nervosa are characterized by an extreme perfectionism, these people are very systematic and hypercritical of themselves, despite their accomplishments, and also suffers try to do physical activities as a good deal as is possible.12They often drop out of friendships, become neurotic and often complain, their self-esteem is very low, and they sink deeper and deeper into depression. Some of the girls that were able to overcome their disorder are proud and relieved that they have finally gained control over their own bodie s.13ANALYSIS OF DATA FROM SURVEYThroughout whole essay I have tried to discover whether the modern media are actually responsible for girls, in American society, who suffer from eating disorder of course there will be as many opinions as there are people. Because of these differences in opinion I decided to survey a number of girls, in order to find out what is the real reason for their dieting. It turned out that most of the interviewed teenagers are convinced that they are simply too fat, which clearly shows a correlation between this problem and its connection to their self- esteem. The modern media are partly at fault, as a resultant of the incessant promotion of skinny figures, but are not of necessity solely responsible, as it could be also be due to trends that occur in each individual society, for example at school, where it is more likely that a girl will be perceived better only because she looks thinner than one of her peers. Unfortunately there is no concrete proof th at any of these factors are in any way responsible, let totally fully responsible, but at the same time there is also no solid proof that states that the modern media has an impact at all on eating disorders, as anorexia and bulimia are psychological diseases.CONCLUSIONAs I have shown, the problem of eating disorders among teenage girls in America is very complicated and there is no one particular factor that has influenced the spread of it. It is impossible to conclude that the modern media is for certain the blame for this spread. There is a strong cultural influence on these girls that pushes them to the point of starvation. It is now believed that society may be able to prevent the spread of eating disorders, by simply changing their eating habits. These changes could include commandment youngsters about the importance of their eating habits and the importance of having a balanced diet. They should also be taught about the ethnic differences in diet, which should not be taken lightly. Yet another strong influence on girls, especially younger ones, but not necessarily connected to the modern media as mentioned above are toy manufactures, which create unrealistic role models for young girls. Despite this, due to advertising, which is a type of modern media, almost everything ranging from books to movies that are advertize automatically become a media influenced problem. Therefore I believe that it is just to say that all of these factors are interdependent. And even though culture sets a certain way of living, when it is promoted by the media, it qualifies as part of the modern media sector. side by side(p) this train of thoughts it is hard to define precisely whether the media influences the spread of eating disorders, or is it just used as a way to pass on information. If this is the case it would be significant to determine what can be classed as media, and what should not be. The modern media, even though it is widely promoted through the use of ad vertising, television series, films or, the most significant of all, the Internet, it does not necessarily mean that they are the source of the information. In most cases the modern media are used as just a way to promote information, but are not in fact the direct cause of it, thus the interdependence.If the modern media does not have as a significant impact as is considered, then American society should focus more on teenage girls and their welfare, and especially take care of them in a way that involves parents, as well as society, paying more attention to their development. According to The American honorary society of Pediatrics current advice is that children should watch less than two hours of television a day and that parents should be involved during this time by monitoring what they are watching and later discussing and explaining the content to them. If this advise would be followed, then peradventure the spread of eating disorders may be limited.14APPENDIXQuestionnaire for English B Extended Essay1. Are youa. Femaleb. Male2. Have you ever diet?a. If so, why?3. How many times?a. onceb. twicec. more than twiced. I am always on diet4. Did you succeeded?YesNot reallyIm in progress5. Are you planning to get on a diet again?YesNoMaybeResponses1. Total number of female responses 1702. 159 have already diet (93%) 11 did not (7%)In order to make it easier to analyze I have assort answers to open question into 2 most significant groupsGirls felt they need to change 148(Mostly because they felt fat or needed to fit their clothes)Did not have a reason 113. a. 23 (14,5%)b. 27 (17%)c. 78 (49%)d. 31 (19,5%)4. a. 12 (7%)b. 44 (28%)c. 103 (65%)5. a. 111 (70%)b. 6 (4%)c. 42 (26%)