How and why do adverts portray negative body images?
“Media images that depict ultra-thin, digitally altered women models are linked to body dissatisfaction and unhealthy eating in girls and women” [1]
Audiences can get influenced easily by the media as the ‘message’ is constantly consumed in many different platforms. ‘Advances in technology and in particular the rise of the mass media has caused normal concerns about how we look to become obsessions.’[2] One of the ways this is done is through advertising; desirable body images, rich atmosphere settings, various types of camera angles are some of the factors used to attract audience to buy or use the product. The Hypodermic needle theory suggests that passive audience are affected by what they see in media and they try to change their lifestyle and body image according to the media’s view on the ‘perfect’ body/life. However there are oppositional readers who are aware that media is mediated and that “we live in a media-saturated world (O’sullivan et al,. 1998: 1-15)’[3].
Skinny body, blonde-hair, blue eyes models are more predominant in TV adverts such as the Abercrombie and Fitch Advert. “Size 0, long, straight blonde hair, Caucasian, and blue eyes is the look among females seen in Abercrombie and Fitch advertisements.” [4]Their adverts are usually in black and white featuring semi-naked models with thin slimmed body and sharp facial features this gives a posh and sophisticated contemporary look. The advert consists of close and medium shot of the body this allows clear view of the models, this makes the audience want to look like the model in the advertisement as the advert portrays the model as attractive, powerful and dominant which is what most of us want to be. These features denote the hegemonic values. Furthermore, this also shows Voyeurism as the audience can get pleasure out of watching semi naked bodies. These specific features of the model used in the adverts relates to the Aryan concept. The Aryan concept supports the view that western culture, body image, skin colour, ethnicity are seen as more dominant and the others are subordinate. Hence, Cultural Imperialism suggests that western culture dominates world as the western people produce most of the media which is then consumed by the third world countries. This might be the reason why media is still following the western ideologies. “The Abercrombie & Fitch brand image’ is heavily promoted as an international near-luxury lifestyle concept’ as it wants people to think that if they buy this product which is classed as ‘luxury’ they are viewed as ‘contemporary’ and that they can be like the models in the advert. ” Furthermore, [5]‘A&F agreed to pay $40 million by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ("EEOC") to all African American, Asian, and Latino applicants who were discriminated against by the company. The applicants argued that the company expected them to work only in low-visibility jobs in the back of the store. The EEOC required A&F to provide equal opportunity to everyone regardless of race, ethnicity, or gender.’[6] Through continuous images of ‘skinny’ body you can sum up that media adverts’ still follow the Marxism view; the division between classes and races. It suggest that white people are dominant in the hierarchy of society which means they have the most power and using them in an advert may connote that you can be powerful if your white or if you come under the ‘Abercrombie and Fitch’ model category .
Thus, Clothing adverts tends to decide how women should look and dress. For example H & M’s TV advert featured skinny model. The model was tall and underweight wearing an H & M jacket above her knees. “Complainants said it was offensive because they believed the woman looked “unhealthily thin” and could give an unrealistic idea of a desirable body image to younger viewers.”[7]The advert uses white background allowing the audience to keep their focus on the model. There are mainly medium and long shots this gives a better view for the audience as this allows them to see the product closely. However, even with the close up shots the advert failed to sell the product and raised controversy. Hence, as mentioned previously that the model was wearing jacket above her knee and wearing unnoticeable clothing underneath, this allows male gaze and portrays women sexually wearing less clothing. This is done to attract males and to hint out to the females that wearing this jacket will make you just as ‘attractive’ as the model. This advert reinforces the current hegemonic values of unrealistic and extreme body image. In addition, H & M is owned by Stefan Persson. Stefan Persson is a Swedish white man with a University degree and lives with his three children and wife. Persson is also known as the eighth richest man in Sweden. The Capitalism theory argues that people with money are more dominate then the people without. Similarly Stefan Persson is wealthy high class man with views that women should be unrealistically skinny, he gets his view across by spending money and producing media text to support it and the people with less money to follow his beliefs and ideologies.
Furthermore, negative body image does not just affect people’s confidence and how they feel it also affects them physically as well as mentally. It causes body dissatisfaction, unhealthy dieting, anorexia...etc. “The price of trying to achieve the ‘perfect’ look may include an eating disorder” “The current media ideal for women is achievable by less than 5% of the female population- and that’s just in terms of weight and size. If you want the ideal shape, face etc... It’s probably more like 1%.” [8]This statistics suggests that media is creating body images that is not achievable leaving the women feeling unsatisfied and lacking in confidence as they cannot fulfil the derisible body image. This also suggests that ‘the increase in eating disorders through the years has coincided with a decrease in women’s ideal body weight as portrayed in the Media’[9]. In addition, “The internalization of the media’s thin ideal produces heightened body dissatisfaction which leads to the engagement in disordered eating behaviour” (Statistics: Eating disorder). Not only ordinary women suffer from eating disorder, ‘celebrities are no exception as “Mary-Kate Olsen was hospitalised with anorexia nervosa...”[10]. The Copycat theory suggests the media manipulates the audience view causing them to become the ‘aspirers’ and makes them to try to imitate the image been portrayed in media to get attention. Hence, the Festinger social comparison theory implies that an individual at an early age compares its body image with their peers and are able to evaluate their abilities. This could also link to sociocultural theory.
According to a plastic surgery company in USA (http://www.mybeautifulbody.com/) [4], their research reveals that’s ‘Barbie’s figure ‘gives young girls a desire to have a thinner body’[11]. “Girls as young as five worry about their weight after seeing images of unrealistically slim figures ...” [12] This shows how media could influence even the younger children who are not as developed as adults are. Furthermore, Harvard University (is an American private Ivy League research university[13]) found that 66% of 12 years old, 50% of 14 years old, and 70% of 17 years olds have been on a diet and thought that they were fat.[14] This implies that the mass media image of perfection causes and increase an individual’s level of body dissatisfaction. They also mentioned “Certain clinics treating eating disorders have banned certain magazines e.g. Vogue and Elle, because of the adverse effects that they have on their patient’s body image and self esteem.” [15] This can apply to the cultivation theory, which suggests that people’s views of the real world can get affected for long term by the constant images of media. Furthermore, Barbie is stereotypical myth which is consumed by children at a really young age; people are fed in images and ideologies from the media.
Moreover, in 1997 the body shop launched a global campaign to raise self-esteem and against the body images portrayed in media. Body shop released print advert for the ‘Love your body campaign’. In the advertisement it featured a fat Barbie naked lying down posing. This caused moral panic as it challenged the stereotype. It also had a quote saying “there are 3 billion women who don't look like supermodels and only 8 who do." [16] The advert used a Barbie doll, with a curvy proportion to challenge perception from skinny supermodels to break the Barbie revolution. Body shop is also partnered with L’Oreal. L’Oreal is well known for skin products made for women. Body shop is owned by Dame Anita Roddick, who is white female also known for her charity work and campaigns about women natural beauty and healthy body image. She also won many awards including Women's Business Development Center's First Annual Woman Power Award, USA, Women’s Center's Leadership Award, and USA...etc. As a successful businesswoman Anita Roddick uses her capitalism to portray women in a healthy and natural way and send out the right message to the audience. This also links to Auteur theory as it suggests the “the director is the author of the film and the film going to reflect his or hers particular visual style, theme...etc.”[17] in this case Anita Roddick is the founder of H & M, the adverts are more likely to reflect her idea, values and beliefs about females will be represented.
Magazines are another important platform, which is still regularly consumed by women. The use of desirable body images in the front cover and covered with celebrity news has attracted many females. ’Recent experiments have shown that exposure to magazine photographs of super thin models produces depression, stress, guilt, shame, insecurity, body dissatisfaction and increased endorsement of thin-ideal stereotype.’[18] Furthermore, “Magazines like Vogue and Elle are banned in many eating disorder clinics because of their known negative effect on patients’ body-image.”[19] Another example could be ‘Teen Vogue’ which is owned by Vogue however it’s targeted at teenagers; it featured tall skinny super models wearing ‘swimsuits’."Magazines regularly mislead their readers by publishing distorted images that have been secretly airbrushed and altered. It is contributing to the dreadful pressure that young people come under to conform."[20] You can sum up that magazine’s like the Vogue sends out negative messages/body images to young females who are more likely to be affected by it, as they are in a stage where they are not fully developed and willing to do anything to look perfect. Vogue is trying to build up a ‘perfect’ body requirement for the teenagers to follow and try to recreate the look. Vygotsky’s Sociocultural theory agrees that ‘exposure to ultra-thin models in the media can lead to increased body image disturbance...’[21] Magazines are no expectation in this case.
However, Vogue and Elle in 2010 tried to break the tradition of skinny people by featuring plus size models. “The [...] edition of French Elle [...] a picture of model Tara Lynn wearing a white jumpsuit on the cover. Lynn is a plus-size model who sports, it says, "adorable belly fat" [...]special edition" dedicated to plus-size fashion.”[22][...] Vogue launched an online section called "Vogue Curvy" dedicated [...] for larger women.”[23]Although, Vogue and Elle one of the largest lifestyle, Fashion, beauty magazine it and they their main magazine feature super skinny models.” It's almost unbelievable to see such a huge magazine cover a real plus-size woman. Along with Vogue dedicating a section to curvy women, it's the most shaking news I've seen,"[24] (Parisian fashion writer Sakina)They’ve tried to challenge the media perception of ‘perfect image’ and featured realistic plus size models to target and embraced the curvy and plus size women. However it is questionable that Vogue would ever accept curvy body image as the ‘perfect body image’. Postmodern Feminism points out that the all women are different and that they cannot be generalized.
Similarly, there are some adverts that try to break the stereotype and try to reinforce in realistic body shapes as well as send out positive messages. For example the Dove soap advert which featured real life curvy women.(Campaign for Real Beauty)“The Dove advertising campaign for a range of soaps and firming products, featuring “normal" curvaceous women in their lingerie, has achieved that unusual thing for an advertising campaign”[25]The advert featured many women with different shapes, sizes, skin colour...Etc to embrace real body image. This advertisement caused moral panic among the media, as it’s deconstructing the view of perfect image into realistic image. This applies to the Cultural Diversity theory as it’s about diverse of culture; it gives respect to other cultures other than the western culture. It’s all about bringing the cultures and societies together. The dove advert tried to be diverse and included women with different sizes shapes and cultures.
In conclusion, considering the points above, the essay could argue that the media is constantly feeding the consumers with unrealistic images which can lead to many different consequences mentally and physically; such as anorexia, depression, body dissatisfaction...etc. However, audience are overcoming it and are starting to realise that these so called ‘perfect’ body images are not realistic to achieve. The media is bombarded with these images because they are trying to follow the western culture, which is known as dominant this is because back in the day western society were one the first society to create media and the other cultures consumed. Since, it’s one of the first media everyone consumed it they continued to portray body images according to the western culture. ‘Cultural Imperial perspective argues that American values and ideologies are imposed upon the rest of the world through media text.’ Researches show that ‘the USA dominates world media with 85% of the global film marker and 68% of the TV market’[26]. Similarly, Post Colonialism suggests that issues of race and the legacy of colonialism have impacted on media and the representation. The essay could sum up that media is trying to break the stereotype and create a realistic and images in media like for example Dove, Body Shop ...etc.
Bibliography
Works Cited
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20. Möschk, Stefanie. “Effects of thin-ideal vs. Natural-ideal media images”. Friedrichshafen
21. Zeppelin University, 2008. Print.
26. [1] Theories Issues and Debates Handout A2.
Moving Image Analysis
A&F Summer TV Ad
H&M TV advert
Print Analysis
E-media (Website) Analysis
Works Consulted .
BOOKS:
Andrews, Maggie, and Elspeth Stevenson. "Media Theories' AND 'Independant Research." AQA media studies: A2: exclusively endorsed by AQA. Cheltenham: Nelson Thornes, 2009. 45-72 AND 139-152. Print.
Dixon, Tina. "Representation." A2 Media Studies Unit 4. Oxfordshire: Phillp Allan, 2004. 20. Print.
Lacey, Nick. "Representation' AND 'Advanced Image Analysis." Image & representation: key concepts in media studies. Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1998. 82-175. Print.
Sardar, Ziauddin, and Borin Loon. "no chapters." Introducing media studies. Cambridge: Icon, 2000. 107. Print.
Wall, Peter. "Advertising." Media studies for AQA GCSE. 3rd ed. London: Collins, 2007. 186. Print.
Williams, Kevin. "Theories of media effects and audience' AND 'Media change and media theory." Understanding media theory. London: Arnold ;, 2003. 121-190. Print.
Williams, Kevin. "Theories of media effects and audience' AND 'Media change and media theory." Understanding media theory. London: Arnold ;, 2003. 121-190. Print.
Möschk, Stefanie. “Effects of thin-ideal vs. Natural-ideal media images”. Friedrichshafen: Zeppelin University, 2008. Print.
WEBSITES:
Postcolonialism Study Guide - n/a - eNotes.comwww.enotes.com
[3] Williams, Kevin. "Theories of media effects and audience' AND 'Media change and media theory." Understanding media theory. London: Arnold; 2003. 121-190. Print.
[9] Wiseman, Gary, Mosimann, & Ahrens, 1992
[10] ap.pyschiatryonline.org/article.aspx
[17] Andrews, Maggie, and Elspeth Stevenson. "Media Theories' AND 'Independant Research." AQA media studies: A2: exclusively endorsed by AQA. Cheltenham: Nelson Thornes, 2009. 45-72 AND 139-152. Print.
[21] Möschk, Stefanie. “Effects of thin-ideal vs. Natural-ideal media images”. Friedrichshafen: Zeppelin University, 2008. Print.
[26] Theories Issues and Debates Handout A2.
