Most models are thinner than 98 percent of American women, according to the National Eating Disorders Screening Program. When you look back on time, if you look back on TV, women were not this thin. Thinness has become thinner in the last decade. In the 50s, models like Marilyn Monroe wore a size 14. Now, models in the 90s are thinner than they were in the 80s, in the 70s, and the 60s, McGill said.
Most people believe that the current preoccupation with looks is all from the media.
What I m trying to show is that it started long ago in basic social and economic transformations that define modern life. Many of the causes are positive marks of progress, like better attention to hygiene, improved middle class parenting, or the rise of the medical profession. But there s a flipside to those things in the escalating pressures they placed on developing young girls, who are experiencing sexual maturation several years younger than their counterparts a century ago, Brumberg adds. Research Ellen Goldsberry said, Over the years, manufacturers have added on slightly, then slightly more, to areas of the body where women have gotten larger the waist, the hips, and the bust. Women feel better about buying dresses in smaller sizes, so the designers figured out that they could please customers by cutting the clothing larger.