Survey

After having made a mood board on the overall issues that people face with body image pressures, I decided to produce a quick survey of females from other courses as well as my own to see what their outlook was. I wrote out 6 multi choice questions with allowance of extra comments if they wanted to make some. Here are the results of the surveys and other comments that those who took part made.

Body Image & The Media.

• Which form of media do you think influences body image the most? (Options were Magazines, TV Adverts, TV Programmes, Music Videos and Social Media)

1/10 Answered Magazines

9/10 Answered Social Media 

• How often do you compare yourself to others? (Options were Never, Sometimes, Always and Most of the Time)

5/10 Answered Sometimes

4/10 Answered Most Of the Time

1/10 Answered Always

• How often do you alter or add a filter to your photos on social media? (Options were Never, Sometimes, Always and Most of the Time)

4/10 Answered Most of the Time

1/10 Answered Never (but interestingly this was only because she doesn't upload photos on her social media account) 

5/10 Answered Sometimes

• How often do you feel self conscious about your body image around other people? (Option again were Never, Sometimes, Always or Most of the Time) 

5/10 Answered Sometimes

3/10 Answered Most of the Time 

1/10 Answered Always

1/10 Answered Never

• What age range do you think is most vulnerable to body image pressures that the media produces? (Options were Below 16s, 17-20, 21-30, 31-40, 41+ or everyone) 

A lot of the people who took part ticked a few different age ranges so here is what there was in total.

Below 16- 3

Everyone- 4

17-20- 4

21-30- 2

• This was more of an open question so I could see what they listed as the main pressures. If you could list 3 main pressures of body image what would they be?
• To have the perfect bum & boobs
• Kylie Jenner perfect make up
• Fashion
• Having a fresh face
• Having pretty, well kept hair
• Appearing feminine 
• Body Weight
• Appearance in general
• Fashion/make up trends
• The 'perfect shape' maintaing it
• Eating the right foods
• Small waist, big bum
• To not be overweight
• Stereotypical hourglass figure
• Creating your body image to impress others not necessarily to please yourself
• Face and skincare
• What to wear and why
• Lifestyle
• White teeth

Girl Model- Documentary

As an aspect of research to my project, I watched a documentary on Netflix about modelling and the pressures of the body image involved. The documentary was following a New York based model scout, who travelled to Russia to collect girls to send to Tokyo for more modelling opportunities. I think it was interesting that the culture of modelling is so different there, and their aspects of beauty is very different from ours.
A Russian scout said in the documentary: "The ideal age to start modelling is 5 or 10 years old, if you're not sure what age to start them modelling, start them young."
In one shot of the documentary, it was interesting to see that there were hundreds of girls being rounded up in a room like cattle and people checking their skin, measurements and skin etc. The American scout explained that for Japanese success, the models she was looking for had to bypass her own aesthetic of beauty, but fit with Japanese ideals. The Japanese ideals in the beauty industry is youthful looking girls, with a cute look, they can't be too tall and have to have clear, fresh skin and big eyes. In the background you could hear some girls being dismissed for being too fat, too spotty or too tall.
Throughout the documentary it follows a 13 year old girl Nadya from Siberia, who is chosen as one of the models to be sent to Tokyo. She is described as having the 'prepubescent' look that the Japanese market favoured. However her trip to Tokyo doesn't go to plan and finds the aspect of modelling very pressuring and has to lie about her age, with Japan not legally allowed to model under 16 year olds.

Black Mirror - Nosedive (2016)

Black Mirror is a series of standalone sci-fi fantasy episodes on Netflix, created and written by Charlie Brooker. A particular episode that I felt was relevant to my project so far is the episode 'Nosedive' where in an alternate reality, society makes you rate others out of 5 for wealth and a good reputation.
I think it's a good concept as it's a fear of many that one day our entire existence will be based on our virtual expectations of one another. Especially with social media aspects like Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, a lot of modern day people seem to consider many likes and retweets as more love and more popularity. Brooker has built on this fear by producing this episode where your entire existence depends on whether or not people like you and you're rated well, it shows that the characters are forced to live fake lives in which they pretend that they are happy in order to impress each other for a good rating.