Body Dysmorphia and the Media

I have started some inital research for my project by looking up online articles on body dysmorphia.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/beauty/article-1195336/Body-dysmorphic-disorder-Four-beautiful-women-distorted-way-THEY-themselves.html This article was really interesting as it provided an insight into how the body dysmorphia sufferers actually saw themselves.

http://www.ejc.net/magazine/article/body_dysmorphic_disorder_does_media_play_a_role/ This article was helpful as it offers a different viewpoint that doesn't completely blame the media.

http://www.media-awareness.ca/english/issues/stereotyping/women_and_girls/women_beauty.cfm This article focuses more on how media plays a role in body image, and I found it to be quite interesting, especially the part about how unattainable the 'ideal woman image' actually is.

Extended Project Proposal

For my extended project, I initially decided I wanted to do something psychology related. I went through several ideas, such as looking into nature vs nurture on our personalities, but eventually I decided on looking into body image in the media. I want to research into the influence the media holds over how young people view themselves. I aim to look at 2 main points during my extended project:

·         How the use of advertisements create a distorted and unattainable view of beauty and how people feel when they compare themselves to the advert

·         How celebrities influence peoples perception of beauty

To collect data on my two points I aim to use questionnaires and interviews on other students to find out what they think.