She bought Vogue and Cosmo at the supermarket just like all of her 12-year-old girlfriends. She subscribed to Seventeen, anticipating the fashion layouts in each issue with a mixture of excitement and dread.
Kari Bruce wanted to look like those beautiful young models on the glossy color pages, even dreamed about it, but doubted that would ever be the case.
Some boys ridiculed her in junior high for being overweight. She was even harder on herself as she looked in the mirror, destroying a self-esteem that was once formidable in the lower grades.
“Every girl goes through it,” said Bruce, who is now 19 and working at the Sunrise Farm Market health food store in Lansing. “What you have to realize is all of those models have been airbrushed a bazillion times. Those girls are not flawless, they’re just like the rest of us.”
But try telling that to most teenage American girls, who despite 30 years of directed feminism still think the ideal body image is just this side of scrawny. Research shows the majority of young girls consider physical appearance as the main indicator of self-esteem, and their own negative body images leave them less confident and able to speak up for themselves than boys.
Puberty is the unfortunate catalyst in the downward shift in girls’ self-esteem, which on the whole is significantly higher than boys during the early grade-school years. Therapists report seeing about twice as many preadolescent boys than girls, but the ratio abruptly switches by age 12. The trend continues into the adult years.
“Girls are bombarded with media messages about the beautiful thin body,” said Dorothy Cantor, a Westfield, N.J., psychologist and president-elect of the American Psychological Association. “They interpret it to be the way they are all supposed to look rather than focus on who they are and how we are all naturally different. It’s a lifelong cycle I see in my women patients.”
The problem is most girls are not going to be rail-thin, just as most every aspiring athlete will never become another Michael Jordan or Martina Navratilova.
“Girls really don’t have much control over how their body shapes change during adolescence,” said Dr. Suzanne Boulter, a Concord, N.H., pediatrician and member of the American Academy of Pediatrics’ Committee on Adolescence. “They can be just as physically active as boys and still put on body fat as compared to muscle for the boys. In fact, they must raise their body fat percentage to 20 percent to even have a menstrual period.
“This gain in body fat alarms them when the media is showing the perfect teen girl who looks like a stick.”
According to a scale developed by the American Association of University Women, various studies report self-esteem among white and Latina teenage girls drops significantly compared to white and Latino boys. The decrease is less among African-American girls — researchers contend mothers of all shapes and sizes are more often role models in this demographic group than celebrities — though there is some academic work to show black girls in middle-class families have decreases in self-worth similar to other middle-class girls.
Medical research clearly demonstrates girls are more concerned about body image.
One study revealed girls become aware of their body shapes by 3rd or 4th grade while most boys don’t consider such things until years later.
The national 1995 Youth Risk Behavior Study showed nearly half of American schoolchildren desired to lose weight, with more than 90 percent of those being females. Another survey showed 5 of 10 girls are unhappy with their bodies by age 13, and 8 of 10 dislike their bodies by age 18.
A new study of 1,000 teenagers commissioned by Seventeen magazine and the Ms. Foundation for Women reported only 38 percent of the girls surveyed said they felt self-confident, while just 52 percent said they felt comfortable standing up for themselves. Other numbers: 47 percent said they could handle criticism, and 60 percent said they were likely to be “sometimes overwhelmed” by other people’s emotional needs when making a decision or taking action.
It all wreaks havoc on the health of teenage girls. A negative body image produces its own kind of stress and associated illnesses. For example, teenage girls are twice as likely than boys to suffer from clinical depression.
“Girls ruminate more than boys,” said Maryse Richards, associate professor of clinical and developmental psychology at Loyola University. “They spend more time thinking and worrying about relationships with parents, friends and members of the opposite sex.
“There is some evidence that when faced with such problems, girls go inward while boys get more active, maybe to play a sport.”
Exercise can help ease depression, according to research.
“Too many girls spend less time rather than more time exercising during their adolescent years,” noted Richards. “They are physically passive when they could be developing good health habits and learning athletic skills they could use for life.”
Teenage girls represent most cases of the eating disorders, and, stopping short of diagnosed anorexia or bulimia, another issue is teenage girls who severely restrict their caloric intake. This might result in calcium deficiencies, which could lead to osteoporosis later in life.
“An eating problem doesn’t have to reach an extreme to affect a girl’s health,” said Dr. Vivian Pinn, director of the National Institutes of Health Office of Research on Women’s Health, in Bethesda, Md. “We need to educate girls about how proper nutrition and not deprivation can help prevent medical problems later in life.”
Marie Wilson, president of the Ms. Foundation, sees other obstacles in the research statistics:
“We must find ways to encourage teenage girls to stand up for themselves, be more accepting of criticism and honor their own feelings rather than bowing to those of others. This will benefit their health for decades to come.
“For one, doing these things helps ward off depression and leaves a woman less dependent on body image. Also, a girl who stands up for herself will break the habit of American women to change doctors rather than demand proper respect and treatment.”
Nonetheless, the self-doubt of teen years can cling to a woman’s psyche throughout her adult life.
“I see women in the store all the time who tell me, `I’m so fat,’ or `My husband is going to lose interest in me,’ ” said Bruce. “They look good. They don’t need to lose weight. I find myself trying to educate older women all the time.”
Bruce suffered through bulimia during her freshman year in high school before counseling helped her turn around a misguided body image.
“I needed to become comfortable with myself and learn about proper nutrition,” she said. “I decided the reason I was more pear-shaped than boys was because Mother Nature wanted me to have children someday. I had to decide for myself and not let my friends control my self-image.”
Of course, peer pressure is a powerful influence on teenage girls and should never be taken lightly by parents. But the University of Michigan’s Child/Adolescent Behavior Research Center reports that peer pressure is overemphasized in cases of alcohol or drug use. Although friends are most apt to initiate use, the family unit is most responsible whether the alcohol or drug use becomes regular and subsequently abusive.
“We need to expose teenage girls to adult female role models rather than movie stars or models,” said Dr. Margery Johnson, a psychiatrist associated with Rush-Presbyterian-St. Luke’s Medical Center who counsels adolescent girls in her private practice. “Girls need to look up to women who are accomplished and secure in their lives.”
Mothers can often fill this need, said Johnson. But she said a strained relationship between mother and daughter might be eased by a third-party female adult mentor for the teenager.
“Girls respond quite favorably to mentoring programs, career days, Take Your Daughter to Work days or internships,” she said. “They love it, and the experience helps broaden the concept of self-esteem beyond physical appearance.”
Another suggestion from Boulter: Parents should allow daughters to establish their own relationship with the family physician by about age 12, allowing private visits and confidentiality as much as feasible. It’s important the teen feel comfortable with the physician. A similar relationship should be cultivated with a trusted gynecologist.
The American Psychological Association recently established a task force on adolescent girls to study the issues of self-esteem and negative body image. The special committee will study the research, conduct interviews and make recommendations by mid-1997.
“By many media accounts, the only time you hear about teenage girls is when pregnancy, eating disorders, drugs, alcohol or runaways are discussed,” said Dr. Karen Zager, co-chair of the APA task force and adolescent counselor based in New York.
“We don’t have a clear enough idea about the strengths of teenage girls or the stresses they confront each day. We particularly want to study body image, and when it crosses over from a normal, healthy concern to an obsession.”
In the interim, Zager offered a few tips for teenage girls and anyone who supports them:
– Parents should be careful to advise girls to eat the right foods but not judge every dish of ice cream or piece of candy that is part of a normal child’s life.
– Family members should beware of insensitive remarks about a girl’s weight. Parents need to be watchful of relatives at holiday time and even certain teachers or coaches. “Research shows clearly that people are likely to comment on girl’s weight during the time of physical development when she is changing hip and lower body shape to accommodate child-bearing years,” said Zager. “It’s often the stray uncle at holiday time who makes the wrong comment.”
– Encourage girls to become involved in sports or other extracurricular activities, such as theater, debate or community services. “This expands a girl’s range of self-value,” said Zager. “It might help her worry less about popularity and dating.”
WHERE TEENS CAN TURN FOR A BOOST
We can always use a boost in self-esteem. Here are some possible uplifting experiences for adolescent girls:
– A new magazine, Blue Jean, which bills itself as being “For teen girls who dare,” portrays what real teen girls are thinking, saying and doing.
It promises no supermodels, diet tips or fashion spreads. Instead, the premiere March/April 1996 issue has stories written by teenage girls about topics as diverse as women’s ice hockey, raising funds for feminist organizations, college life and starting a youth empowerment organization. There is a health section written by a physician.
Blue Jean invites submissions of original artwork, poetry, photography, fiction and non-fiction from teenage girls (with compensation up to $100 on publication; a guideline sheet is available). The magazine plans to be advertising-free; subscriptions are $29 for six bimonthly issues.
Write Blue Jean, P.O. Box 90856, Rochester, N.Y. 14609, or call 716-654-5070.
– The Museum of Science and Industry has a permanent exhibit, “Kids’ Starway: A Child’s Path to Self Discovery,” that may be just the thing for a young girl struggling with early puberty. The interactive display targets 7- to 12-year-olds, featuring high-tech videos, animatronic puppets and hands-on exhibits covering topics such as self-esteem, feelings and alcohol and substance abuse in entertaining, non-threatening fashion.
