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Maddy Fairchild
Mrs. Harrell
English II
May 15, 2015
Body Image and Eating Disorders
In the mid 1800s the perfect body was a curvy, well-filled woman. Through the past
centuries, the idea of beauty for young women has changed dramatically. Each year the ideal
view of a perfect looking lady is skinnier and more fit than ever before. With the active role that
social media plays in our society, as well as famous models and actresses, this new body goal is
rapidly spreading to many teenage girls. There are many ways that this new body style is
appealing the younger female generation. This trending body type is generally unachievable to
most women today. The way the media portrays a perfect body has a direct effect on the
amount of teens controlled by an eating disorder.
Eating disorders have not always been a major topic of discussion: the issue of eating
disorders struck the modeling industry in the early twenty-first century with the 2006 anorexiarelated death of twenty-one-year-old Brazilian model Ana Carolina Reston and the 2007 death of
Israeli model Hila Elmalich from the same disorder (Chittom, Finley). Many of the common
eating disorders that can be found in teens today include anorexia nervosa, body dysmorphia
disorder, and bulimia nervosa. Anorexia nervosa is a disorder where an individual starves his or
herself because they have the perception that they are overweight. Body dysmorphia disorder is
when a persons mental image of his or herself is different than their actual appearance. Bulimia
nervosa is an eating disorder where an individual will binge, eat a lot of food in a small amount
of time, followed by a purge, or self-induced vomiting or taking laxatives. A study conducted by

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Harvard Medical students claims that, Once Fijian girls were introduced to the standards of
beauty presented in shows such as Melrose Place and Beverly Hills 90210, the prevalence of
eating disorders increased. There had been nearly no instances of eating disorders in Fiji prior to
the introduction of television to the island (Ballaro, Wagner). In recent years many women
have felt the need to achieve the dream body as depicted by the media. This alone has increased
the number of eating disorders found in younger aged women, thus trying to achieve societys
goal of what is said to be the perfect body. Many women have often admitted to having an
eating disorder just to try and get a hot body. Teenagers are prone to believe what the media
says and will do whatever they have to in order to receive approval from the people around them.
The media has played a role in the increase of eating disorders throughout the years,
however, can one thing be blamed for the entire psychological problem? Many girls are prone to
eating disorders that can be caused by other things besides the media only. More frequently,
eating disorders are found in children whose parents participate in extremely strict diets and
frequent exercising in order to lose or maintain weight. As more and more studies take place,
there have been many more causes for eating disorders that have been revealed. Although the
media is a major influence on eating disorders in young girls, there have been several attempts
from the media to try and stop these problems. In the summer of 2007, New York thenGovernor Eliot Spitzer signed into law a bill designed to foster the early identification and
prevention of eating disorders in child actors and models (Ballaro, Wagner). This law was put
into place to try and keep younger actors and models away from the life-destructing path of an
eating disorder.
I believe that the media and society do influence the amount of eating disorders in young
girls. As more models are becoming size triple zero, an unachievable size for average girls to

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achieve, an eating disorder is most girls last resort. Not only does the media enforce small sizes
of actresses and models, the pictures that are put on display for the public are photoshopped and
edited. Thanks to the advent of graphics editing software, photo alteratio became increasingly
common in advertisements and other media presentations. By many accounts, the process of
digital manipulation became an industry standard such that advertisers were trained to utilize the
programs before releasing any photograph (Issitt). As more digitally enhanced pictures are
being released to the public, many girls are suffering from anxiety or depression due to the
incapability of not being able to achieve this body goal. If the media were to put more emphasis
on average sized women instead of extremely thin and thigh-gapped models, the number of
eating disorders would most likely have a dramatic decrease. If the media does not stop giving
girls an unrealistic body image goal, then the amount of eating disorders, and deaths from these
problems will continually rise.
As time goes on, more cases of eating disorders have surfaced. With the extreme role
that the media plays in todays society, this can only get worse. Although there have been many
attempts of damage control by the media, this is still a continual issue. The media can only
change what they are doing in order for this problem to get any better. Unless women entirely
stop trying to achieve the goal that is constantly put in front of them by the media, eating
disorders could spike into a much higher cause of death in young girls alone.