According to Leah Zajac a thirteen year old from Michigan, the perfect Western body is a woman who has a long torso and legs, is tan, has long hair, a toned stomach, and has an hourglass figure. Young adults throughout America and around the world have the same distorted image causing them to resort to attempt to change their bodies. Through the eyes of social media, an image of the perfect body has developed itself and evolved to the point in which it has affected America’s youth. In recent times, the media has proved itself to have a large impact on young people around the world. Because of this, our view of the "perfect body" has been distorted.
Due to the severe rath social media around the world, editing photos has made a large impact …show more content…
A example of this is shown in a recent study of the correlation between eating disorders and the time they spent browsing social media. "The participants who spent the most time on social media throughout the day had 2.2 times the risk of reporting eating disorders, compared to their peers who spent less time on social media. And participants who reported most frequently checking social media throughout the week had 2.6 times the risk, compared with those who checked least frequently” ("Greater Social Media Use Tied to Higher Risk of Eating and Body Image Concerns"). The more time the participants spent on social media, the more exposure they had to it's impractical standards of beauty, thus the likelier they are to develop an eating disorder. Adolescents often attempt to change themselves based on the people around them, so if they are seeing these unrealistic figures, they will resort to anything to mirror theses images. The same goes for when adults are exposed to other types of media such as television shows. In a recent article published by Pediatrics Journal, a large group of teens were surveyed on a variety of topics as they aged. By the time the participants reached ages 23-25, a shocking 10.5% of women had reported using laxatives to lose weight and about 12% of the men had reported using muscle building products (Klass, Perri). The reason for this large number is because of the media's everlasting portrayal of the "perfect body" in both young men and women, this may force a person to abuse drugs to attain or reach this peak physical condition. Because of the effects of social media, teens are exposed to poor body
Due to the severe rath social media around the world, editing photos has made a large impact …show more content…
A example of this is shown in a recent study of the correlation between eating disorders and the time they spent browsing social media. "The participants who spent the most time on social media throughout the day had 2.2 times the risk of reporting eating disorders, compared to their peers who spent less time on social media. And participants who reported most frequently checking social media throughout the week had 2.6 times the risk, compared with those who checked least frequently” ("Greater Social Media Use Tied to Higher Risk of Eating and Body Image Concerns"). The more time the participants spent on social media, the more exposure they had to it's impractical standards of beauty, thus the likelier they are to develop an eating disorder. Adolescents often attempt to change themselves based on the people around them, so if they are seeing these unrealistic figures, they will resort to anything to mirror theses images. The same goes for when adults are exposed to other types of media such as television shows. In a recent article published by Pediatrics Journal, a large group of teens were surveyed on a variety of topics as they aged. By the time the participants reached ages 23-25, a shocking 10.5% of women had reported using laxatives to lose weight and about 12% of the men had reported using muscle building products (Klass, Perri). The reason for this large number is because of the media's everlasting portrayal of the "perfect body" in both young men and women, this may force a person to abuse drugs to attain or reach this peak physical condition. Because of the effects of social media, teens are exposed to poor body