Amid the self-acceptance campaigns and "born this way" anthems of this generation, poor body image still lies, and apparently has gotten worse, according to a study by Glamour Magazine.
Thirty years ago in 1984, the magazine held a groundbreaking survey asking women how they felt about their bodies, resulting to 41 percent saying they were "unhappy" with their body, while most declared they were "too fat". Since these findings have been published, self-acceptance and a winning body image have been talked about in the mainstream, supported by celebrities like Byonce and Jennifer Lawrence.
Still, despite this movement, body image has gone worse, said the Glamour survey participated by 1,000 women between 18 and 40 years old. Jesse Fox, Ph.D., assistant professor at the Ohio State University and was part of the team who conducted the survey, analyzed (and reanalyzed) the data, discovering that the essential message on body image is the same today as it was 3 years ago.
The survey found a rise of 13 percent- 54 percent of women reported being unhappy with their bodies. Meanwhile 8- percent of the participants confessed to feeling bad just by looking at the mirror.
This discovery motivated the research team to find the reasons for this seeming epidemic of self-hatred, and why a minority of women do love their bodies.
According to Fox, the biggest culprit is social media. Sixty four percent of women report that seeing pictures on sites like Instagram and Facebook of other women make them feel bad about their body. Glamour adds that all experts they interviewed attest to this. Evelyn Meier, a n American University researcher studying about Facebook's effects on body image, said that in this day and age, there is a bigger platform for us to obsess over appearance. The researchers also found that women compare themselves more to other girls and not celebrities.
