Body Stereotypes: Do Gender Differences

Majority of today’s teenagers suffer with the thoughts that they will never be “good enough,” loved, or happy as they are. The positive or negative mental perception that people have of themselves physically is what’s called a ‘body image.’ Although this image may be the total opposite and not reflect on the real appearance, or how others see it, there is no in between of the two body images: positive or healthy body image and negative or poor body image. A healthy body image is considerably attractive and poor body image as unattractive. A negative body image is commonly reported and influenced by the three main aspects: age, gender and society (Davidson and Cataldo, 221-222).
Body images are mainly in the minds of adolescents as they age

Because it is so difficult for the most part to obtain these popular goals, their self-perceptions and attitudes often become negatively induced. Also, according to sociocultural theory, the more an individual is exposed to media embracing the perfectionistic depiction of the human body, the less favorable and insecure an individual will feel about their body image and evaluations of their quality of life (Brennan, Lalonde and Bain, 130). Although both genders receive heat for nothing being up to the bodily standards of faultlessness, females are more heavily impacted than are males. In Jamie Santa Cruz’s editorial “Body-Image Pressure Increasingly Affects Boys” found on theatlantic.com published last March 10, 2014, an associate professor of pediatrics at Boston Children’s Hospital, Dr. Alison Field, and lead author of the study of body-image’s increasing effect on boys speaks about her very own opinions on this matter. Dr. Field makes valid points on the differences between the expectations of a female and male idealistic figure; females predictably want to be slimmer, and males are worried over gaining more weight to become muscular instead of losing it. This is the major cause of females

Media, family and friends tend to send an immoral message to individuals unknowingly. Family and friends can find themselves making a joke about someone’s body without the knowledge that it may cause the person to actually feel like something is really wrong with their body. Media is already putting darts into their self-esteems with flawless body images, having family and friends ridicule them as well is not going to help in any way. The media comes in many forms such as: magazines, the music industry, television and pictures, and simply opinions that are on the internet for others to comprehend. For example, in Rhiannon and Holly’s Opinion “Body Image Limited,” they condemn the typical women’s fashion and lifestyle magazines like Vogue, Cosmopolitan and Seventeen Magazine for the inconsiderate atmosphere they conspire. They both talk about a young 14-year-old body image campaigner that started a petition against the digitally enhanced or “Photoshopped” images that are presented, and acquired 30,000 signatures. That’s 30,000 people that felt that this false advertisement should be discontinued, or felt harmed by it because they began to belittle themselves. Rhiannon and Holly make an astonishing statement that these magazines are sending “the underlying message [is] that you are your body and your body isn’t good