Models advertise designer apparel for a reason. Clothing and accessories appear beautifully on their flawless, toned bodies, which marketer's use to capture the consumer's attention. Staff Writer Emmily Bristol for the ViewNews.com, states the average American woman standing 5- feet 4- inches and wearing a size 12 on the top and 14 on the bottom (Bristol) is a far cry from the average fashion model measurements, sited in the website SoYouWanna.com which are 5"8-5"11 inches with a petite size 6 frame. (www.soyouwanna.com/site/syws/model/model.html) Critics who hastily review this information may assume that the modeling industry, and mainly the media, is responsible for the growing number of eating disorders in the United States. This is not the case however; the modeling industry and the media in general, cannot be the scapegoat for this issue. The opponents fail to recognize the psychological and physiological issues that surround eating disorders, issues that are not affected by advertisements in magazines or television.
Cable channels today, such as the E! Channel, or The Entertainment Network, and its sister station, the Style Channel, only support the reasoning that Americans have a fascination with models, even if they do not promote a realistic body image. Researcher Deanne Jade, for the Nation Center For Eating Disorders, concludes that:.
"Some style setters in the media frankly refuse to adjust their policies, they say, that women like to look at perfect bodies, they won't buy magazines with pictures of ordinary people, and that they are not quite as silly to believe that these fantasy figures, photographically enhanced in many cases, are bodies that they should aspire to." (Jade, 2002).
These so called "style setter's" assume that the masses are intelligent enough to distinguish what is real and attainable in their own lives. Yet research shows that, over 50% of girls between the ages 11- 15 years read fashion and beauty related magazines, the age that body image is at most fragile due to physical changes of puberty and where the tendency for social comparison is at its peak.