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Who thinks I need a perfect body? Perceptions and internal dialogue among adolescents about their bodies

journal contribution
posted on 2006-09-01, 00:00 authored by M McCabe, L Ricciardelli, D Ridge
The main aim of this study was to provide a detailed examination of the nature of the messages that adolescent boys and girls receive about their bodies. Forty adolescent boys and 40 adolescent girls participated in an in-depth interview to gain an understanding of the range of potential ‘sources’ of body-related messages. Messages were organized around the source of these messages (self, mother, father, brother, sister, female friends, male friends, media). There were consistent gender differences in the way that adolescents received and interpreted messages about their bodies. Overall girls received more positive and more negative messages than boys did. Boys reported having received virtually no negative messages from most people. The content of internal dialogue among adolescents revealed that messages about the body could be interpreted, distorted, and deflected. The implications of these findings for preventing body image-related problems and disordered eating among adolescents are discussed.

History

Journal

Sex roles

Volume

55

Issue

5-6

Pagination

409 - 419

Publisher

Springer Netherlands

Location

Amsterdam, The Netherlands

ISSN

0360-0025

eISSN

1573-2762

Language

eng

Publication classification

C1 Refereed article in a scholarly journal

Copyright notice

2006, Springer Science + Business Media, Inc.