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Body Image in Children
The concept of body image in children incorporates a number of factors, including awareness of one's appearance; perception of one's body shape in comparison to others; beliefs about appropriate or desirable weight, shape, and appearance; self-esteem, sensitivity, or embarrassment about one's weight and appearance; and judgments about other people concerning issues of weight, shape, and appearance. Children's body image is also linked to their actual weight and fitness as well as healthy eating and healthy activity behaviors. Distinct from eating disorders and obesity, body image is primarily perceptual (e.g., how accurately children view their bodies in comparison to others and to a healthy ideal) and emotional (e.g., feelings about their own weight, shape, and appearance).
Media messages may directly or indirectly undermine positive body image by showing unrealistic examples of body shapes and sizes as desirable or normal, promoting unhealthy eating behaviors, displacing activities that involve exercise or other esteem-building activities, and portraying people who are overweight as unintelligent, unpopular, and targets of ridicule. Girls receive more specific media messages about unrealistic ideals for weight and appearance than boys do, and girls are much more concerned about being too fat and about their overall appearance.
The Development of Body Image in Childhood
Although there is an enormous body of research and theory related to body image and eating disorders in adolescence and young adulthood (until recently, primarily focused on females), far less is known about the development of body image in childhood. By around the age of 2, most children have developed a self-concept, which gradually expands to include gender identity, racial/ethnic identity, specific physical characteristics (e.g., hair color, freckles), and clothing preferences. Somatic sensitivity (exaggerated dissatisfaction and embarrassment about overall appearance and specific body parts like ears or nose) does not usually show up until puberty; however, sensitivity about weight and body shape has become increasingly apparent at younger and younger ages. This decreasing age of onset for body dissatisfaction mirrors the increase in attention paid to issues of weight and appearance in the mass media and in popular culture in general.
The Measurement of Body Image in Children
Most of the commonly used psychometric scales and other measures of body image for adolescents and adults are not appropriate for use with children. The most widely accepted measures of body dissatisfaction in children involve scales of figures (shown as silhouettes, line drawings, or photographs digitally altered to hold facial features, hair, and skin tones constant). A set of seven to nine figures is shown, ranging from very underweight to very overweight; children select the image that most closely matches their own and the image that matches what they would like to be. Assessment of perceptual distortions (i.e., discrepancy between a child's perception of his or her body shape and the actual shape) has been most effectively accomplished using video projection or video distortion techniques. Studies have shown very low incidence of perceptual distortions in body image among children, even for girls, until late childhood approaching puberty. Body dissatisfaction, however, is another story.
The Extent of Body Dissatisfaction among Children
Until recently, researchers thought that children were relatively unaware of their bodies, and that social comparison and body dissatisfaction did not begin until puberty. Studies have now shown that children as young as 6 years old are already concerned about being overweight, and that by the third grade about half say they have been on a diet. The percentage of children who say they “like the way they look in pictures” declines dramatically across the elementary school years, and some studies have found that, among children ages 7 to 12, almost half the girls and one third of the boys want to be thinner. Although there seem to be few gender differences in overall appearance satisfaction and body esteem during early and middle childhood, dissatisfaction with weight and body shape is significantly higher for girls by second or third grade, and their idealized body size becomes increasingly thinner as they move through elementary into middle school. Findings from studies of body image in boys have been mixed; some show that boys experience similar declines in body dissatisfaction as they approach puberty (although they typically want to be bigger and more muscular rather than thinner), whereas other studies show that puberty may actually increase body satisfaction for boys.
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