Think back to your high school years. Think beyond the awful music, the reckless behaviors, and the young love. Specifically, think about how you perceived yourself at that time. Were you confident? Happy? Were you comfortable with who you were?

I consider myself a lucky girl. I have always been rather confident and secure with who I am and what my body does for me. This doesn’t, however, mean I never experienced moments of major self-doubt. I still regret chopping my hair off to mimic Jonathon Taylor Thomas (why didn’t my parents say “no” to that crazy request?!?). The point being, we all know what it feels like to dislike our bodies and have low self-esteem. This blog will focus on the relationship between body dissatisfaction and self-esteem in adolescents, particularly adolescent girls. Why do we feel this conversation is an important one to have? Well, a staggering 40% of adolescent girls ages 9-10 years old report being or have been on a diet. That’s shocking! We’ve read the most recent literature in this field, and below are some of the highlights.

1. One study found that the more television white girls, black girls, and black boys watched, the greater likelihood there was for them to report low self-esteem. But….here’s where it gets interesting. The more television white boys watched, the greater their self-esteem. Although the reasons for the gender and ethnic differences are unknown, researchers suggest the difference may be due to the television content (what shows the different groups watch). For instance, media comparisons made available for white boys are quite positive in nature (portrayed as powerful, strong, and rational) compared to media available for white girls (needy), black girls (promiscuous), and black males (mischievous).
2. Gender differences exist. Specifically, boys are less threatened when asked about their body shape, report significantly higher self-esteem levels, rate their current body shape significantly smaller, rate their desired body shape significantly larger, are more satisfied with their bodies, and derive significantly less of their self-esteem from body shape and weight compared to girls.
3. Girls who reported being at least somewhat satisfied with their bodies gain less weight and are less likely to develop frequent binge eating than those who are less satisfied with their bodies. Also, younger adolescents (<15) have a higher association between body dissatisfaction and binge eating than their older counterparts (adolescent girls >15). Why does this matter? It demonstrates just how important it is to prevent body dissatisfaction!

So now you’re probably thinking, great….we know one of the keys to being happy with your body is through having a high self-esteem. BUT-how can you increase your self-esteem? First, let me define global self-esteem: “positive or negative attitude toward a particular object, namely, the self”. High self-esteem represents feelings that one is “good enough” and has been related closely to life satisfaction, wellbeing, and positive social relations.  Based on the some of the latest and greatest research, here are two really cool ways to reduce body dissatisfaction and increase self-esteem in adolescent girls.

1. Practice self-affirmation exercises. A recent study demonstrated that self-affirmation reduces body dissatisfaction by switching the sources by which we derive our self-esteem. Rather than basing our self-esteem off of our body weight and shape, we determine our self-esteem by experiences of acts of kindness. In this study, adolescent girls were asked to elaborate on their past acts of kindness by answering 10 questions such as “have you ever forgiven another person when they have hurt you”? Girls in the control condition (which were not asked the self-affirmation questions) derived a significantly greater proportion of their self-esteem from body shape and weight than those in the experimental group (who were asked the 10 questions about random acts of kindness) indicating that self-affirmation reduces defensives and boosts self-esteem, alters current perceptions of the body shape and shifts the sources from which people derive self-esteem away from body shape and weight.
2. Another really cool study found evidence to support the notion that sedentary behavior does more than just increase your risk of developing chronic diseases. In fact, sedentary behavior may be important to aspects of mental well-being independent of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity engagement. One study found that those adolescents who spent the most time sedentary reported having the lowest sports competence as well as the lowest perceived physical strength, and physical conditioning. Additionally, even those adolescents who spend a few hours a day being moderately or vigorously active but spend their remaining hours sedentary are at an increased risk of low self-esteem. So how can adolescents increase their self-esteem? Research has shown that participating in extracurricular activities such as athletics, dance or reading books can lead to improved self-esteem. Additionally, those adolescents who spend more quality time with their parents are also more likely to have a higher self-esteem.

OK. Enough science writing, I promise. I hope the information I provided for you above starts a fire inside. In fact, I really hope you are saying to yourself, “This isn’t right! We need to do something about this!” We agree! It’s about time we start applying research proven techniques to young women, so they can avoid feelings of self-doubt, unworthiness, and body dissatisfaction.