Recent books like "The Lolita Effect" (Overlook TP, 2008) and "So Sexy So Soon" (Ballantine Books, 2009) have raised concerns that girls are being sexualized at a young age, and Starr said her study is the first to provide empirical evidence for the trend. Regardless, the authors underlined, "low media consumption is not a silver bullet" against early self-sexualization in girls. ![]() Another possibility is that mothers of girls who displayed sexualized attitudes and behaviors had responded by restricting the amount of TV and movies their daughters could watch. "This pattern of results may reflect a case of 'forbidden fruit' or reactance, whereby young girls who are overprotected from the perceived ills of media by highly religious parents … begin to idealize the forbidden due to their underexposure," the authors wrote. However, girls who didn’t consume a lot of media but who had religious mothers were much more likely to say they wanted to look like the sexy doll. Girls who consumed a lot of media but who had religious mothers were protected against self-sexualizing, perhaps because these moms "may be more likely to model higher body-esteem and communicate values such as modesty," the authors wrote, which could mitigate the images portrayed on TV or in the movies. Mothers' religious beliefs also emerged as an important factor in how girls see themselves. "As maternal TV instruction served as a protective factor for sexualization, it’s possible that higher media usage simply allowed for more instruction." The power of maternal instruction during media viewing may explain why every additional hour of TV- or movie-watching actually decreased the odds by 7 percent that a girl would choose the sexy doll as popular, Starr said. ![]() On the other hand, mothers who reported often using TV and movies as teaching moments about bad behaviors and unrealistic scenarios were much less likely to have daughters who said they looked like the sexy doll. The authors suggest that the media or moms who sexualize women may predispose girls toward objectifying themselves then, the other factor (mom or media) reinforces the messages, amplifying the effect. But girls who watched a lot of TV and movies and who had mothers who reported self-objectifying tendencies, such as worrying about their clothes and appearance many times a day, in the study were more likely to say the sexy doll was popular. Media consumption alone didn't influence girls to prefer the sexy doll. "It's possible that for young girls, dance involvement increased body esteem and created awareness that their bodies can be used for purposes besides looking sexy for others, and thus decreased self-sexualization." (The researchers cautioned, however, that a previous study found that young girls in "aesthetic" sports like dance are more concerned about their weight than others.) Being involved in dance and other sports has been linked to greater body appreciation and higher body image in teen girls and women, Starr said. ![]() ![]() The girls in this latter group actually chose the non-sexualized doll more often for each of the four questions than did the public-school group. Most of the girls were recruited from two public schools, but a smaller subset was recruited from a local dance studio. Starr and her research adviser and co-author, Gail Ferguson, also looked at factors that influenced the girls' responses. "Although the desire to be popular is not uniquely female, the pressure to be sexy in order to be popular is." Other studies have found that sexiness boosts popularity among girls but not boys. "It's very possible that girls wanted to look like the sexy doll because they believe sexiness leads to popularity, which comes with many social advantages," explained lead researcher Christy Starr, who was particularly surprised at how many 6- to 7-year-old girls chose the sexualized doll as their ideal self.
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