With more than a third of American children and adolescents’ overweight, you would think that Mattel’s slender Barbie doll would be a good role model for little girls. Not so, according to some critics. If Barbie was a real woman, she would have less that 17 percent body fat, a neck too thin to hold her head up, a waist too small to house a full liver and intestines, and ankles and feet too tiny to walk. One group of researchers estimated the likelihood of a woman having Barbie’s body at one in 100,000. Yet some women strive for impossible bodies, with more than 20 million suffering from eating disorders such as anorexia and bulimia. Other research has shown that 40 to 60 percent of preadolescent girls are concerned about their weight, and almost 70 percent of thin models influence their perceptions of an ideal weight. Statistics like these cause consumer advocacy group such as the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood (CCFC) to call for action, especially when targeting young girls. For example, the CCFC is concerned about Mattel’s Barbie Be Anything, Do Everything partnership with the Girls Scouts, in which Daisy and Brownie Scouts (that is, kindergarten through third graders) can play an interactive game on the Girl Scout’s Web site and earn Barbie participation badges to wear on their uniforms. a. Do you think it is wrong for Mattel and other doll manufacturers to markets dolls with unrealistic body proportions to young girls? Explain why you think that way. Discuss other examples of marketers targeting females with unrealistic body concepts
With more than a third of American children and adolescents’ overweight, you would think that Mattel’s slender Barbie doll would be a good role model for little girls. Not so, according to some critics. If Barbie was a real woman, she would have less that 17 percent body fat, a neck too thin to hold her head up, a waist too small to house a full liver and intestines, and ankles and feet too tiny to walk. One group of researchers estimated the likelihood of a woman having Barbie’s body at one in 100,000. Yet some women strive for impossible bodies, with more than 20 million suffering from eating disorders such as anorexia and bulimia. Other research has shown that 40 to 60 percent of preadolescent girls are concerned about their weight, and almost 70 percent of thin models influence their perceptions of an ideal weight. Statistics like these cause consumer advocacy group such as the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood (CCFC) to call for action, especially when targeting young girls. For example, the CCFC is concerned about Mattel’s Barbie Be Anything, Do Everything
a. Do you think it is wrong for Mattel and other doll manufacturers to markets dolls with unrealistic body proportions to young girls? Explain why you think that way. Discuss other examples of marketers targeting females with unrealistic body concepts
Trending now
This is a popular solution!
Step by step
Solved in 2 steps
