As France’s parliament considers a landmark bill that would outlaw media images glamorizing the extremely thin, psychology researchers are reporting some of the most definitive findings yet on how these images affect women.
In the May issue of Psychological Bulletin, University of Wisconsin-Madison postdoctoral researcher Shelly Grabe and psychology professor Janet Hyde describe a sweeping analysis of 77 previous studies involving more than 15,000 subjects. In it, they found that exposure to media depicting ultra-thin actresses and models significantly increased women’s concerns about their bodies, including how dissatisfied they felt and their likelihood of engaging in unhealthy eating behaviors, such as excessive dieting. [continue reading…]
Apprentice-style entrepreneurs who have an inflated sense of their own abilities may jump into new business ventures with insufficient regard for the competition and the size of the market, new research has found.
Psychologists say that people who are so ‘full of themselves’ and cocksure of their own abilities are the ones most likely to venture into markets that may be too small to accommodate another profitable business.
Research led by the University of Leicester, funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, has shown that overconfidence among businesspeople is a reason why many ventures fail in the first few years. [continue reading…]
TV commercials influence what you want to do in life
If women find their husbands reluctant to fold the laundry or wash the dishes, they may want to hide the television remote. New research from the University of New Hampshire shows that men, in particular, are influenced by television commercials that more often portray them in a career environment than doing domestic duties. [continue reading…]
In the now-famous Vanity Fair photo, 15-year-old Miley Cyrus is suggestively wrapped in a satin sheet, her hair disheveled, her red lips in a pout.
Some say the photo is nothing than an artistic portrait of a pretty teenager. Others say it’s a disturbing, Lolita-like way for a young girl—let alone a Disney princess who’s every move is watched and emulated by legions of young fans—to be depicted.
But is it really so unusual? In an article published in a new edition of Dalhousie University’s Nabokov Online Journal, Meenakshi Gigi Durham argues the media—from advertisements to Seventeen magazine—are circulating damaging myths that distort, undermine and restrict girls’ sexual progress. [continue reading…]
