About one-third of women would trade at least a year of their lives to be thin, according to a study conducted on college campuses in the United Kingdom.
The study, led by the University of the West of England and eating disorder charity The Succeed Foundation, surveyed 320 undergraduate women on college campuses. Sixteen percent said they would trade at most one year, 10 percent said two to five years, 2 percent said 10 years and 1 percent said 21 years or more.
“It has to do with the social comparison women tend to make over one another,” said Martha Tompson, a Boston University clinical psychology professor. “Part of the more societal ideas we have are driven by the media’s representation of women’s bodies.”
That social comparison, she said, originates from television shows, magazines and pop culture and affects the lives of college-aged women.
“The discrepancy between the ideal self and the real self is huge,” Tompson said.
“It takes more of a personal sense of self-confidence than the majority of women can muster to not feel bad [about their weight],” Tompson said. “The more the discrepancy, the worse [they’ll] feel.”
While the survey might seem to reveal extremes, it reflects similar results as a study conducted on American college students.
Results suggested that 93 percent of women claimed to have had negative thoughts about their appearance in the last week, and one-third of those thought about it several times a day, according to a 2006 survey published in NASPA’s Journal of Student Affairs Research and Practice. About 75 percent of American college students felt dissatisfied with their appearance.
However, most BU students said they would not go to the lengths that their U.K. counterparts said they would in order to stay thin.
“I would not trade a year of my life,” said Karen Go, a senior in the College of Engineering. “[That image] is just the media telling you that you have to be thin to be accepted.”
Other students suggested living a healthy lifestyle without obsessing over weight.
“I don’t think it’s worth watching your weight all the time,” said Jenna Hassan, a freshman in the College of Arts and Sciences. “I think you should live to be healthy, but not to think about what you eat constantly.”
Marlena Sherman, a junior in the Sargent College of Rehabilitation and Health Sciences, suggested that those who would trade a year consider the benefits of leading a healthy, not thin, lifestyle.
“I think that’s unhealthy to want to trade a year of your life,” she said. “If you’re exercising and eating right, I think you wouldn’t need to trade that year to be thin. It should be about being healthy.”
