Hello everyone, welcome to Radionews, today’s column will focus on “The impact of the media on men’s body perception”. We often talk about the female object, you know, the person who is valued for her looks and not for her intellectual abilities. Well, dear listeners, the same is true for men. While women are encouraged to lose weight, men are faced with ideals that emphasise a slim, muscular body. And yes, men also pay attention to their physical representation. So, whatever one’s gender, one adopts a self-objectifying behaviour, i.e., one considers one’s body as an object.
But why do men today all try to look like Dwayne Jonson, you know, the big guy who wrestled before he became an actor? Well, the answer is simple: the media play a major role in the relationship and representation that each individual has with his own body. Indeed, it is not uncommon to see extremely muscular men, whether in films such as Batman or James Bond, in video games such as Duke Nukem, or in sports and health magazines where we are exposed to shirtless men with abs and biceps, so impressive that all women succumb. However, today, the evolution of technology has made the situation worse. Indeed, we are all addicted to our smartphones and spend most of our time on social networks like Instagram or TikTok, on this kind of application, the influencers we follow will put forward these thin and muscular bodies, and as we are good little subscribers, we like this content. And out of admiration for these people we will try to look like them.
Indeed, despite less research on the male population, both men and women are exposed to the same problem. These ideals are difficult to achieve, and two sessions at the local Basic Fit gym will not get you there. Thus, the difficulty of achieving this valued ideal will have many negative consequences for men.
First of all, we will engage in a heightened perception of our own appearance, in order to come closer to the ideals of beauty submitted by the media and in interpersonal interactions. Thus, by becoming the main judge of our body, we will consider ourselves as an object to be evaluated. However, because of the difficulty of approaching these often-unattainable ideals, we will pay more attention to our appearance and thus increase our sense of body shame. A feeling experienced when we adopt a heightened perception of our own body due to the inability to meet beauty standards. This brings us to the feeling of control, i.e., the degree to which one feels they can control their body image. As a result, an individual may feel responsible for the way they perceive their body, so this can either alleviate anxiety about social comparisons, or provoke a more critical view of their body image, when they are not satisfied with the efforts they have made.
In addition to these three effects, the desire for thinness and muscularity can be added as equally harmful consequences. These two factors are linked to a constant socio-cultural pressure to be thin and muscular. And because of the inability of individuals to achieve this goal, they engage in risky behaviours such as taking anabolic drugs for muscularity, or controlling their diet for thinness. This type of behaviour is not without risk, and can cause eating disorders or anxiety, linked to the desire to control one’s weight.
But to understand why this happens, we need to rely on theoretical models developed in Psychology, in addition to the impact of the media. And yes, unfortunately it is human to want to reach this ideal, you are not crazy! In 1954, a social psychologist by the name of Festinger developed the theory of social comparison. He hypothesised that when individuals need information about certain aspects of themselves, such as their skills or opinions, they will set up a system of comparison with others in order to position themselves. This theory is based on three main assumptions. Firstly, it refers to the fact that we compare ourselves to others in order to position ourselves on a specific dimension, for example beauty. Then according to the comparison carried out, there are two possibilities, either the individual compares himself with someone better situated on this dimension, in this case it is an ascending comparison, for example “I am less beautiful than Leonardo DiCaprio”, which will have a negative impact on his self-esteem, because it is not gratifying for the individual who carries out the comparison, we are not all lucky to play in Titanic. Or secondly, he will make a downward comparison, that is to say with someone less well situated than him on this same dimension, for example “I am more beautiful than master Yoda”, which will increase his self-esteem, because of the valorization of the individual to the detriment of others, and as a wise Jedi would say, may beauty be with you young listener. Upward social comparison can, however, motivate an individual to work on themselves in order to get closer to this ideal. Whereas downward social comparison allows the individual to compare himself to worse people, which allows the individual to put himself into perspective. Finally, it has been found that, in general, individuals tend to make top-down social comparisons because of its self-improvement or self-protective function for the individual. If you don’t fit this generalization, it’s because you like to suffer, I think, and you have a perfect right to do so!
Thus, it is observed through this theory and media evidence that we are influenced by a multitude of factors to resemble beauty ideals. However, individuals will only compare themselves to these ideals if they feel they are relevant and accessible, which is why advertisements featuring slim, muscular men might affect men’s self-objectification more than images of hyper-muscular men.
I will conclude this podcast with a loving message to the male community: “Love yourself as you are, favour authenticity over superficiality, be yourself! Personally, I love my body, which is crucially lacking in muscle, but I can live with that! See you next week, same time, same day!
Sources :
Griffiths, S., Murray, S. B., Krug, I., & McLean, S. A. (2018). The Contribution of Social Media to Body Dissatisfaction, Eating Disorder Symptoms, and Anabolic Steroid Use Among Sexual Minority Men. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 21(3), 149‑156. https://doi.org/10.1089/cyber.2017.0375
Galioto, R., & Crowther, J. H. (2013). The effects of exposure to slender and muscular images on male body dissatisfaction. Body Image, 10(4), 566‑573. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bodyim.2013.07.009
Bernard, P., Gervais, S. J., Holland, A. M., & Dodd, M. D. (2018). When do people “check out” male bodies? Appearance-focus increases the objectifying gaze toward men. Psychology of Men & Masculinity, 19(3), 484‑489. https://doi.org/10.1037/men0000122
Tiggemann, M., & Anderberg, I. (2020). Muscles and bare chests on Instagram : The effect of Influencers’ fashion and fitspiration images on men’s body image. Body Image, 35, 237‑244. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bodyim.2020.10.001
Saucier, J. A., & Caron, S. L. (2008). An Investigation of Content and Media Images in Gay Men’s Magazines. Journal of Homosexuality, 55(3), 504‑523. https://doi.org/10.1080/00918360802345297
Anderson, J. R., Holland, E., Koc, Y., & Haslam, N. (2018). iObjectify : Self- and other-objectification on Grindr, a geosocial networking application designed for men who have sex with men: Self- and other-objectification on Grindr. European Journal of Social Psychology, 48(5), 600‑613. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.2350