Body Image: What I found out

After doing research on “Body Image” and how body image effects people. I learned about how having a negative body image can badly impact a person and their self esteem. Some people tend to get this idea of the perfect body image from social media. I also talked about how models body image is portrayed is unrealistic but they are who people strive to be like them.

Since my last blog post, I have created a survey on how people in the Science Leadership Academy (SLA) community actually feel about their body image. Throughout the time that my Survey has been up and people were taking it, I have encountered an incident where body image comes into play. I have just joined the cheerleading team at SLA Beeber, and one of the first things said to me was “Are you ok with losing 5 pounds?” At the time I wasn’t really thinking about it, I was just excited to be on the team. However after going home I realized how my project is so relevant in our community. I know the reason behind them asking me to lose 5 pounds, I need to be lightweight, however incidents like these can really impact a person.

My plan for my original research was to create a survey that would tell me how people in SLA feel about their bodies, if people think models have the perfect body, if they could change any part of their body what would they change and what type of social media user they are. After 2 weeks of people taking my survey I received 55 responses. 34 females took my survey, 20 males and 1 preferred not to say. One of the questions I asked was “On a scale from 1 to 10 how do you feel about your body?” these are the responses I got.

After seeing the data I got from my survey, I was surprised to see how diverse people feel about their bodies. I noticed that none of the 55 people who took my survey rated their body a 10. 17 people said they felt 5 or lower about their body, which means that some people don't really feel that well about their bodies. As I kept looking at my responses I noticed that 20% of the people who took my survey said that they agreed that models have the perfect body image when asked if they agreed or disagreed that models have the perfect body image.

I wanted to see if there was a connection between the people that felt 5 or lower about their bodies and the people who thought that models have the perfect body image. I found out that the majority of the people who felt 5 or less about their bodies agreed that models have the perfect body image. This was shocking for me because I learned how models body image is photoshopped sometimes and are an unrealistic body image goal.

Along with my previous questions I wanted to know what people would change about themselves if they could what they would change. The most common things people wanted to change were their stomach, they wanted to be curvier, and some wanted clear skin. People said they wanted a flatter stomach, bigger butts and clear skin. Overall I was surprised to see the responses I got from my survey. I have learned that models do play a part on the way that people view themselves. And that the people in the SLA community have insecurities about themselves. This is something that can affect so many people. For my agent of change I plan to share this information with my advisory in a presentation. And hopefully this will change their mindsets or make them aware of the issue.

For more information of my research visit my Annotated bibliography.