I am interested in this topic for many reasons. First, media has such a prominent role in our lives today and brings many positive and negatives elements. Media can be beneficial by spreading information quickly and making it easier to do things like keeping in touch, getting directions, or even paying bills. Nevertheless, media also can be harmful in ways such as creating unrealistic images and unattainable goals, allowing more opportunities to cyber bully, and constantly providing a source for comparison. The second reason I chose this topic is because I am a female and feel a personal connection with beauty standards and self-consciousness. American females are especially scrutinized in the media for not upholding the standard of beauty and suffer from more pressure to fit that standard than any other group. Lastly, I would like to research this topic because I would like to have a better understanding of the changing definition of beauty throughout the years. It is interesting to think that a few decades ago, certain women who are unhappy with their appearance today would have fit the beauty standard. Why is the standard of beauty what is it today and what are the factors affecting its change? The pressures to conform to the beauty standard have dramatically increased with the growing usage of media especially social and entertainment. The affects it can have to a person can be extremely damaging and even life threatening. Symptoms can include depression, anxiety, eating disorders, distorted self-image, self-deprecation, and suicide. 

The central claim of "Does Instagram Promote Positive Body Image?" is that in a world of advertisers is dictating what is beautiful and what is not, Instagram is a media escape from that because it is full of real people posting real pictures. The article showed the vicious cycle of advertisements showing a standard of beauty that makes the costumer feel poorly about self-image and buy the product. This issue applies to women and men. Women's ads include typically thin, retouched, blemish and wrinkle free white women promoting a beauty product. Men's ads are typically muscular, lean men who promote exercise or steroids. The author of this article, Sarah Gervais is an Assistant Professor in Social and Law Psychology. Her work has been featured in Marie Claire and Glamour magazines. Her bias could be writing this article with a strong female emphasis because she is a female and has written for female magazines that value accepting all types of beauty. 


The central claim of "Body Image of Women" is the causes and effects of poor body image in women. It begins by explaining that marketers will often use beauty and attractiveness to sell its products. This, however, allows marketers to determine the beauty standard. It explains that media images of ridiculously thin women on television; social media, movies or magazines are a large contributor to negative body image in women. Over fifty percent of nine to ten year old girls feel better about themselves if they are on a diet although only eighteen percent are truly overweight. The effects include eating disorders, depression and anxiety that can lead to substance abuse problems and low self-confidence. The article claims the way to fix this problem is changing the way media portrays women to release the pressure to fit the beauty standard. This article was written by Tabitha Farrar whose information I could not find. Nevertheless she used many sources to write this article, making the article seem accurate after checking the information in a few of her other sources. There was no bias. Her values include decreasing the number of women suffering from Body Image issues and anxiety.

The central claim of this video is to show 3,000 years of women's beauty standards. I liked this source because it focused on American women's bodies, although it did show other cultures too. In each segment, a woman was shown from all angles wearing a white one piece with small descriptions of what the standard was at that particular time. Over the years, the standard changed dramatically, even within a decade. This source especially interests me because so many factors play a role in shaping the beauty standard and each standard reflected on what was popular at that time. For example, the 1960's standard reflected the popular models of that time such as Twiggy. This video was created by the popular website Buzzfeed, which believes me to think it is credible. It did however have a strong bias to only American women because it spent the majority of the three-minute video on American standards beginning with the roaring twenties. This leads me to believe that the producer is an American and wanted to focus more on the American audience.

The research question is arguable because media can both set an unrealistic beauty standard and provide a place for cyber bullying and body shaming but also can be used to spread the word about empowerment movements and boost self-esteem through "sharing" and "commenting."I agree with everything in my three sources except for how Instagram shows pictures of "real people" in my first article because retouching is such a popular practice today. Each perspective was similar to mine already, which was helpful in strengthening my current views. I might need to balance my research to better fit both sides of the negative and positive argument.

