Body Image and Advertising

At present, advertising is powerful enough to influence and change adult’s behavior and it is not surprising that it can more easily change children’s perception about world and their role in it. One of negative ways how advertising influence children is the way of shaping their views about their appearancies and bodies that is mostly resulted in the dissatisfaction and eating disorders.
According to the article “Eating Disorders: Body Image and Advertising”, most of commercials promote mainly the beauty and its importance in woman’s and girl’s life. For instance, the study that examined toy advertising illustrates that “50% of commercials aimed at girls spoke about physical attractiveness” (“Eating Disorders: Body Image and Advertising”). With a purpose to “drive product consumption”, advertisers “normalize unrealistically thin bodies” images in ads that surround girls in modern society. All these images can lead to harmful consequences such as exercising abnormal diets, smoking, different eating disorders and anxiety. “The number one wish for girls ages 11 to 17 is to be thinner, and girls as young as five have expressed fears of getting fat. Eighty percent (80%) of 10-year-old girls have dieted” (“Eating Disorders: Body Image and Advertising”).
Although “body image” is the main prerogative of girls, nowadays boys also show their dissatisfaction of their bodies. Boys begin to worry about “their physical appearance as advertising […] raise the standard and idealize well-built men” that lead to “increase in obsessive weight training and the use of anabolic steroids and dietary supplements that promise bigger muscles or more stamina for lifting"(“Eating Disorders: Body Image and Advertising”). Because of the fact that commercials which promote and emphasize “unattained perfect body image” can be found everywhere, we need to realize and understand their harmful consequences on children and teach them to think about ads critically.