For more than fifty years,
Barbie has been influencing young girls all around the world with her super skinny body, her amazing long hair and her inexhaustible wardrobe. You see, Barbie is an 11.9 inches tall plastic doll created by
Ruth Handler and inspired by Ruth’s daughter, Barbara. Barbie is a product of the
Mattel Company, which was founded by Ruth Handler and her husband, Elliot Handler, in 1945. According to Ruth:
"my whole philosophy of Barbie was that through the doll, the little girl could be anything she wanted to be. Barbie always represented the fact that a woman has choices.” (Mattel, 2012) It is true, Barbie has had several careers in her lifetime. Mattel argues that she still teaches girls who play with her today that they could be anything they wanted to be (Stone, 2010). That is, except perhaps, a size zero. You see, it can be equally argued that Barbie is providing an unhealthy body image world-wide with her
"unrealistic body proportions." (Hoskins, n.d.) This negative influence that Barbie has on young girls can lead to major consequences, such as plastic surgery and eating disorders.
Cue Dana Marie Lupton...
Misrepresenting Women
Through the years, this doll has become a part of
popular culture, as Mattel CEO Jill Barad says that Barbie is
“a worldwide symbol of popular culture.” In 1999, 99% of 3- to 10-year-olds in the United States owned at least one Barbie doll (Rogers, 1999). Despite Barbie's
career achievements, she has been promoting an unhealthy body image to all women.
Dr. Carole Lieberman, psychiatrist, stated that "Barbie has been the number one most destructive force on the self-image of women all over the globe." (Stone, 2010). Hoskins (n.d.) and Mirror-Mirror (n.d.) support Lord (1994) who states:
"If Barbie were a real woman, she’d be so lean she wouldn't be able to menstruate. Her narrow hips and concave stomach would lack the 17 to 22 percent body fat required for a woman to have regular periods – and a failure to menstruate is one of the symptoms of anorexia nervosa, a condition of self-starvation that principally afflicts young women."
This Barbie image we see sends us a message: it tells us that thin is pretty and that if we look like this, our lives will be fabulous. (Stone, 2010) Most notable is the controversial
Slumber Party Barbie. This kit included a scale that was stuck at 110 lbs and also included a book titled ‘How to Lose Weight’ and two shocking words were written at the back of the book: Don’t Eat! When it first came out, it was so controversial that Mattel removed the scale, but the book stayed in the set (Rehabs.com, n.d.). This undoubtedly is part of what is contributing to why girls have body image issues: they are confronted with an
unattainable body shape, but they give so much importance to this doll that they get obsessed with their image and their weight.
Am I Skinny Enough?
Two studies have been really relevant in this case: one made in 2006 and the other in 2010. Because of the desire for thinness emerges in girls around at around age 6 (Dittmar, Halliwell & Ive, 2006), the
first study involved 162 girls aged from 5 to 8 to examine if Barbie was a cause for young girl’s body dissatisfaction. During the study, the girls were exposed to either a Barbie doll, a U.S. size 16 Emma doll, or no doll at all and had to complete an assignment afterwards. The study revealed that the
"girls exposed to Barbie reported lower body esteem and greater desire for a thinner body shape than girls in the other exposure conditions." (Dittmar, Halliwell & Ive, 2006) On the other hand, the older girls were not affected by this immediate negative impact that Barbie has, demonstrating that Barbie may have no longer acted as a role-model for them. Nevertheless, the study shows that even if older girls don’t consider Barbie as a role model at their age, an exposure to extremely
thin dolls can modify young girl’s
body image, increasing the risk of eating disorders and weight cycling in the future.
The second study was conducted on 117 Dutch girls aged from 6 to 10, testing if the girls who played with Barbie had an unhealthy body image effect placed on them and if they had the same food intake as the other girls who played with other toys. In the test, the girls were randomly assigned either a thin doll, an average-sized doll or
Legos. After playing with their dolls for ten minutes, the girls had to complete a questionnaire concerning body image and also had to eat. There were no differences between the girls who played with thin dolls and the others in the body image questionnaire, but the girls who played with thin dolls ate significantly less food (Anschutz & Engels, 2010). This study illustrates that even though the girls who played with thin dolls might not have a body image issue, they still want – unconsciously – to be thinner, which is why they reduce their food intake compared to girls who played with the average-sized doll. So, even if Barbie might not directly affect the young girl’s body image, she still influences them on their
food intake, which may lead to potential eating disorders later on.
Nip & Tuck
In 1992, women spent 300 million dollars on plastic surgery every year (Lord, 1994) and this number has been increasing over the years.
Rachel Rettner (2008), states:
"In 2008, an estimated 750 000 cosmetic procedures, 271 000 of which were surgical, were performed in people aged 20 to 29, according to the ASPS. And 81 900 surgical procedures were performed on children and young adults aged 13 to 19."
Today, some women are known for the surgeries they got to look like Barbie as much as possible.
Cindy Jackson is probably the most famous of them all. She said:
"I looked at a Barbie doll when I was 6 and said, ‘This is what I want to look like.’ I think a lot of little 6-year-old girls or younger even now are looking at that doll and thinking, ‘I want to be her." (Stone, 2010 & Dittmar, Halliwell & Ive, 2006). She has spent more than $55 000 dollars on more than twenty plastic surgeries in order to look like a living Barbie doll (Lord, 1994 & Mirror-Mirror, n.d.) Another living Barbie doll is
Heidi Montag, a famous reality T.V. star. The women starring in The Hills had ten surgeries – all at one time – and stated that she just wanted to look like Barbie. According to
Hoskins (n.d.), people would later tell her that she was very beautiful before and that her surgeries were not necessary, which made her regret her decision.
![]() |
| Why Renee, Why?! |
Other examples of women succumbing to society's pressures to undergo the knife include
Jennifer Gray and most recently
Rene Zellweger, both of whom whose trademark good looks has been radically changed. Nevertheless, there are those, such as Frances Armstrong, who writes that:
"the small size of Barbie tends to cause a sense of emotional distance between player and doll. […] The small scale is an advantage because it limits the degree of identification between child and doll."(Mitchell & Reid-Walsh, 2002). The fact that she looks like an adult also creates a distance between her owner and herself, which can explain why some girls may not be affected by Barbie.
Perhaps... however, young girls are groomed from an early age to look, behave and think a certain way within a
patriarchal society. Barbie is inevitably an extension of a male dominant society that imposes its ideas of beauty on the masses.
References
Anschutz, D. J. & Engels, R. C. M. E. (2010). The Effects of Playing with Thin Dolls on Body Image and Food Intake in Young Girls. Sex Roles, 63(9-10), 621–630. doi :10.1007 /s11199-010-9871-6
Dittmar, H., Halliwell, E., & Ive, S. (2006). Does Barbie Make Girls Want to Be Thin? The Effect of Experimental Exposure to Images of Dolls on the Body Image of 5- to 8-Year-Old Girls. Developmental Psychology, Vol. 42, No. 2, 283–292.Hoskins, S. (n.d.). The Negative Effects of Barbie on Young Girls and the Long Term Results. Divine Caroline.com.Lord, M. G. (1994). Forever Barbie: the unauthorized biography of a real doll. New York : Morrow and Co.
Mirror Mirror. (n.d.). Barbie and Body Image. Body Image of Women. MirrorMirror.orgMitchell, C. & Reid-Walsh, J. (2002). Researching Children's Popular Culture: The Cultural Spaces of Childhood. London ; New York : Routledge
Rehabs.com. (n.d.). Dying to be Barbie: Eating Disorders in Pursuit of the Impossible.Rogers, Mary F. (1999). Barbie Culture. London ; Thousand Oaks, Calif.
Stone, Tanya Lee. (2010). The Good, the Bad, and the Barbie : a Doll's History and Her Impact on Us. New York : Penguin Group
Barbie Media. (2012). About Barbie: History BarbieMedica.com.About The Author
Camille Arsenault is presently studying at
Champlain College Lennoxville located in Quebec, Canada.
Barbie On My Mind was written as part of class project for Consumerism, Leisure and Popular Culture in the
Department of Humanities.
Call For Submissions!
Would you like to be a
Guest Contributor? The Wicked Academic is always looking for quality contributions to both the website and the academic online journal. For further information check out
The Printing Press and
FAQ section.
