Real women on real beauty: self-discrepancy, internalization of the thin ideal, and perceptions of attractiveness and thinness in Dove's Campaign for Real Beauty
Kimberly Bissell
University of Alabama
Amy Rask
Media Research Lab
Introduction
Research in the area of body image distortion suggests the media are one of many potential variables related to increases in disordered eating, especially in college and adolescent female women. The media are often held partially responsible for young females’ desire to be extraordinarily thin because of the number of media messages promoting the ‘thin ideal’. The general conclusion among researchers is that exposure to thinness-depicting...