Women Body Image Analysis

Great Essays
Advertising and media roles often play an important role in everyday life, and messages often relay to young women about beauty are often harmful and misinterpreted.The female image and what women should or could look like in marketing and advertising in particular is a trending controversial topic. Advertising can be portrayed through positive ways but often times they are negative. In one scholarly article written by (British Journal), reads “ the mass media is described as the loudest and most aggressive purveyors of images and narratives of ideal sender beauty.” For many women who are exposed to these advertisements often think about themselves as not beautiful or not falling under the stereotype of not having the perfect “ideal body”. All women in today’s society are particularly vulnerable to be disturbed and uncomfortable with talking about their self image. The study of controversial images through the media has raised questions about whether it is real or fake content.The negative outcomes created from the “women’s ideal body” in media should be approached in advertisements. Before looking at the negative impacts of advertisement and marketing within the woman’s “perfect ideal”, as advertisers, there are ways they make edits to make the woman more beautiful. …show more content…
In other words, as viewers of this media, often notice how flawless models are. Flawless skin, perfect makeup, or high lifted cheekbones are traits in which categorizes a women that is “ideal”. Photographers that are put in charge of a certain advertisement, will use photoshop or an editing device to take out the blemishes to make the image more appealing to sell a product. In a recent scholarly article, Feona Attwood discusses the controversy of the latest Dove Campaign between the photographers and the viewers. Attwood discusses “.. an invisible photoshop artist goes to work, elongating her neck, arching her eyebrows widening her eyes, etc.” This is evidence that women are just being used to sell beauty products not only in this advertisement, but in every other type of women beauty product. As another detrimental practice toward impressionable women, advertisers and marketing executives will use models of impractically small size.(British Journal) This strategy is the foundation that “skinniness sells”. A spokesperson for the agency representing top model Naomi Campbell, says “ The clients would say that they are selling a product and responding to consumer demand. At the end of the day, it is business and the fact is that these models sell the products.” This is evidence that it is advertisers’ job to promote a product no matter what potentially negative impact on consumers might be realized. Female consumers will see the women in these advertisements as a standard to which they should hold themselves despite the potential health risks. Advertisers and product executives probably feel this practice is validated even though the images and appearances they create are not realistic for most consumers. If, therefore, the potential consumer impact occurs, then the observers of this imagery could affect their self opinion and esteem. If women embrace this vision of a perfect ideal body, they might be inclined to engage in practices or activities to achieve this goal at personal expense and potential health risk. For years and even decades, vulnerable women have been inundated with images depicting the pinnacle of beauty as requiring an unhealthy and impractical thinness. In attempting to achieve this endpoint, these women may adopt dangerous beliefs and practices that might lead to extreme dieting and eating disorders. According to Sarah Grogan,“ The average woman could be expected to have dieted to try to lose weight..” It has been said …show more content…
A glaring example of the extreme thinness is from a model sharing her story behind the scenes of these productions. (Mary ellen Zucckerman) Filippa Hamilton, a 5’10 and 120 pound Ralph Lauren model was considered extremely underweight after visiting several doctors. After her first advertisement for the Lauren company, editors digitally manipulated her appearance to make her look even more skinny than she already was. They went to say she was fired due to the fact she was “overweight”. The picture below shows her actual weight on the right compared to the edited version. This exemplifies the extremes to which advertisers may go to create a product image regardless of the potential negative impact on consumers of their

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    Marketers, those who are in charge of a company’s advertisement, have to appeal to the largest group of people that they can for it to be truly successful (Source F). To do this, they attempt to create a commonplace among viewers such as Dove’s, “Camera Shy” campaign which focused on insecurity. Though this commercial focused primarily on women, it focused on women of different ages and ethnicities and only focused on women to lift this group up and fight society's pressure on women to be conscious about their body. Positive messages like this can have a long lasting impact on many, especially young adults. In “Advertising: Information or Manipulation?”…

    • 575 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Overwhelmed by media body images of thin models, body builders, young girls and young men are growing up convinced that being thin and buff is the ideal to be accepted in the world. According to Michelle Siegel, Ph.D., in her Article “The Body Betrayed” states that the average person – sees between 40 million to 50 million ad commercials on television a year which one of every 11 commercials has a direct message about beauty. In these commercials it gives men and women the ideal of an average American man, and woman, and how people should look like for example a woman with a body of a model that is 5 foot ten, and 107 pounds and as for men tall handsome with a built muscular body. What is shown is not really how a person really is; men and…

    • 206 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Examining Commercial Advertising Advertisements are everywhere we go and almost on everything we know. Yet advertisements portray men and women very differently. They also affect men and women more than some people realize. The films, Miss Representation, Killing Us Softly 4, and Tough Guise 2 really thoroughly discussed the problems and effects of advertisements for both men and women. Advertisements can portray women as sexual objects with ideals of beauty, and men as powerful.…

    • 1113 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Throughout history companies have customarily used advertisements to sell products to potential consumers. Generally speaking, the objective of an advertisement is to gain the attention of a specific group of people to which the company knows their products are more likely to sell. However, current times suggest, rather than enticing young men and women into purchasing their products, many advertisements can lead to negative behaviors such as eating disorders, self esteem issues, and representing themselves in a provocative manner. To clarify, in an effort to fit in with society's standard's of appearance, many young women and men turn to eating disorders. Ad's from companies such as, Victoria's Secret, do little to deter this type of behavior.…

    • 719 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Physical beauty plays a captivating role in amongst many young people yet true aesthetics are derived internally. “That's always seemed so ridiculous to me, that people want to be around someone because they're pretty. It's like picking your breakfast cereals based on color instead of taste,” John Green rationalizes. The pressure to become physically beautiful plays a greater role in lives of female more so than males. Beauty commercials target females more often; many females fall victim to obsessing about their physical appearance wearing gobs of makeup, leggings, a trendy top and shoes that are easily identifiable to most people.…

    • 503 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In the 21st century companies display the human body in a provocative manner with nudity on billboards and advertisements in magazines. As a person looks at an advertisement for perfume or nail polish, the eyes go straight to the naked body of the model. When seeing the beautiful, sexy model with the beauty products, the buyer falls in the trap of buying the products believing that they will also feel beautiful and sexy. They want to seek the pleasure the model exhibits while wearing the product. The consumer sees a beautiful model with a perfect body that most women would love to attain.…

    • 1175 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    In an economy with free markets, consumers are often bombarded with advertisements of possible purchases. The products often seem to be displayed in a utopian world as if they make their affect perfection instantaneously. Often times, companies use men and women who are images of perfection. In fact Susan Bordo points out the use of captivating buyers with images of men who resembled attributes of perfection, such as fitness and youth, in her essay “Beauty (Re)discovers The Male Body.” The projection of instant perfection to consumers allows the consumer to believe that they may achieve the image projected within the ad if they buy the product displayed.…

    • 1751 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Jean Kilbourne

    • 1180 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Labels on women should not stigmatize them and should not exist. Ads do not let women be who they want to be, but what advertisement considers who a woman should be. This demonstrates how advertisements twist the ideals of what a woman should be by enhancing…

    • 1180 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Campaign For Real Beauty

    • 960 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Beauty comes in all shapes and sizes, right? Dove’s “Campaign for Real Beauty” has spoken out about the different forms of beauty. Whether they be skinny, curvy, tall, short, young, or old, Dove has made it a point to use their campaign in order to empower every person possible. Virginia Postrel, author of “The Truth about Beauty,” disagrees completely with Dove and their campaign. In her article, Postrel criticizes the beauty that Dove praises (Postrel).…

    • 960 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    This fictional image is impossible to achieve naturally. Advertisements on TV, in magazines, and on billboards are constantly focused on the female image. Statistics show that comments about a woman’s image were made about 28% of the female models in TV commercials, where as the male image was only commented on 7% of the time. The media’s focus on a woman’s “looks” is everywhere in today’s society, and with advertisements and commercials constantly reminding women of their looks, they are forced to compare themselves to the models within the advertisements. One-statistic shows that in one study 69% of girls admitted magazine models influence their idea of a perfect body.…

    • 1410 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In today 's society most advertisements focuses on women and their bodies. Women’s bodies are often dismembered in ads and shown in scarce clothing which represents most advertisements. Very often advertisements uses woman 's body in sexualization and objectification way. Sexualization is a common tactic advertisements and commercial uses which to create a frame of what their opinion of “ideal beauty” is. Jean kilbourne argues that ” the pressure on women to be young,thin and beautiful is more intense than before.…

    • 1091 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    What is the feeling when you see yourself in the mirror? Gratitude? Satisfied? Or shame and disappointed? In the articles “Enhancing Your Body Image” Donatelle informs readers that body image is important in many ways.…

    • 183 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The part of the short ad that really captures how unrealistic society’s perception of beauty is how even after the professionals finish their makeover and she is a gorgeous women they elongate her neck, make her lips fuller, and her eyes bigger through Photoshop on the computer. If professional makeup artists and hairstylists cannot make a regular women beautiful by society’s standards, then what hope to the rest of the female population have in making themselves beautiful? The ad ends with everything fading into black and these words come on screen “no wonder our perception of beauty is distorted” (red). This ad blames the movie, television, and magazine industries for…

    • 1529 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    The Dove Real Beauty Campaign: An Attempt to Revise the Definition of Beauty The definition of “beauty” depends on many variables including age, gender, and culture. Furthermore, it is subjective to the interpretation of individuals and its portrayal in the media. In recent years, the media has generally portrayed the "ideal woman" as tall, white, thin, with a cylindrical body, and blonde hair (Nelson). Dove’s…

    • 1318 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Great Essays

    The exploitation of women in mass media is the use or portrayal of women in the mass media (such as television, film and advertising) to increase the appeal of media or a product to the detriment of, or without regard to, the interests of the women portrayed, or women in general. Feminists and other advocates of women's rights have criticized such exploitation. The most often criticized aspect of the use of women in mass media is sexual objectification. According to News 24, dismemberment can be a part of the objectification as well. Women are oftentimes considered objects instead of subjects.…

    • 1625 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Great Essays