As an expert in food attitudes and behaviors, the Loricorps research group of the University of Quebec at Trois-Rivières (UQTR) proposes a reflection following the article published in The Press last october 271 about a virtual game featuring a “fitness club” owner whose goal is to make his customers lose weight, accumulating points for each calorie lost.
Posted at 12:00 p.m.
Our team wonders about this game which encourages the internalization of the ideal of thinness, even a “muscular thinness » leading to artificial weight, diet culture and only rational eating. Following the negative impacts of COVID-19 on dietary health, all of these phenomena are fertile ground for dysfunctional eating attitudes and behaviors leading to restrictive, bulimic and emotional eating habits.
Concerning more specifically the ideal of thinness, studies show that little girls aged barely 5 years internalize thin and sometimes muscular bodies as body standards to be achieved. This internalization, which remains stable during adolescence and adulthood, thus increases the risk of developing a dysfunctional relationship with one’s own body and diet, but also with those of others, as in the case of grossophobia.
Thinness has not always been synonymous with beauty in our society and is not currently in certain societies other than ours.
Historically, the representation of beauty has evolved over the centuries. For example, during the Renaissance, curves were an aesthetic ideal of the “well-being” illustrated by painting. The birth of Venus by Sandro Botticelli. However, during the XXe century, the ideal of beauty has changed. During the 1940s, Marilyn Monroe conjured up the image of the ideal hourglass-shaped body. In 1960, the model Twiggy instituted a shift in the body ideal towards a more pronounced thinness. It was from the 1990s that the phenomenon of thinness became synonymous with beauty in our society. The internalization of the ideal of thinness largely depends on our culture strongly conveyed by the media (social and traditional).
In response to these worrying findings, the Loricorps transdisciplinary team wishes to highlight the distribution of the short film Reflect, by Disney, featuring Bianca, a ballet dancer who brings to life a fable about body acceptance as an active ingredient of positive self-esteem. ” [L’héroïne] fights against its own reflection, overcoming doubt and fear by channeling its inner strength, grace and power,” Disney wrote in a statement.
These are encouraging actions that promote a culture of body diversity for girls and boys in our society.