[acb-hsp] From Alternet`.org

[peter altschul]

I Want to Be Sexy ...  Just Like Mommy
  July 26, 2012
  There's the cliche image of a little girl putting on her 
mother's makeup, mimicking with studied precision the sucked-in 
cheeks of blush application, the open mouth of mascara-face, the 
puckering up post-lipstick-application.  There's the oft-repeated 
scenario of a kindergartner sashaying in oversize heels, placing 
a hand on either hip as she poses for an imaginary audience.
  These are well-worn images in part because they ring so true: 
Girls learn what it means to be a woman by watching their moms.  
A new study has not only corroborated that but also found that 
mothers are a strong predictor -- even more than the amount of 
media consumption alone -- of whether a girl will regard herself 
as a sex object.  The study sample was too minute to be 
definitive and has to be followed up with future research, but it 
raises important questions about how to best prevent young girls 
from regarding themselves as Bratz dolls.
  Researchers had a group of 60 girls between the ages of 6 and 9 
choose between two paper dolls that were identical save for their 
dress: One wore revealing, "sexy" clothing, while the other wore 
"stylish but non-sexualized clothing." The researchers found that 
"girls overwhelmingly chose the sexualized doll over the 
non-sexualized doll" when asked which one they would like to look 
like and which one would be popular.  Given our sex-saturated 
culture, this surprised no one.  What stwasst surprising was this 
conclusion: "We do not find media consumption to be the primary 
culprit for early sexualization of young girls." The researchers 
went on to say that "the quantity of TV and movies watched is 
not, in and of itself, a risk factor for young girls' sexualized 
self-views." Instead, it's "the interaction between media hours 
and maternal self-objectification that creates vulnerability for 
early sexualization." That is to say, media-immersed girls with 
moms who view themselves as sex objects were more likely to pick 
the sexy paper doll.
  Why? Well, the researchers speculate, "high media consumption 
may provide young girls a predisposition towards early 
sexualization which is only realized for those whose mothers 
display reinforcing self-objectifying attitudes and behaviors.  
Alternatively, girls of highly self-objectifying mothers may 
model their mother's self-objectified attitudes and behavior, and 
effectively begin to self-sexualize and self-objectify in the 
presence of myriad reinforcing images afforded by high media 
consumption."
  In her 2008 book "The Lolita Effect: The Media Sexualization of 
Young Girls and Five Keys to Fixing It", Gigi Durham bemoaned 
that "the turn of the new millennium has spawned an intriguing 
phenomenon: the sexy little girl ...  with preternaturally 
voluptuous curves, and one whose scantily clad body gyrates in 
music videos, poses provocatively on teen magazine covers, and 
populates cinema and television screens around the globe." But 
the aim of her book wasn't just to criticize media that 
sexualizes little girls -- instead, she emphasized the importance 
of parental influence.
  That is in part because of the pervasiveness of media -- 
specifically sexualized media -- in kids' lives.  "Walking 
through the mall you're getting huge posters and billboards, it's 
just everywhere.  It's really impossible to escape," says Durham, 
a professor at the University of Iowa.  "You can't keep your kids 
in a bubble.  The best approach is to be proactive and teach them 
to be critical consumers."
  In Durham's research with middle-school girls "it was very 
clear that mothers were influential in their lives," she says.  
"When I did meet girls who were able to take a critical 
perspective on the media and thinking of themselves in 
multidimensional terms rather than just in terms of sexuality, 
they almost always said it was their mom who sat down with them 
and had discussions about the media -- either their mothers or 
some other important adult in their life, but most often moms 
came up."
  Focusing on moms as the study does is problematic, though, says 
Sharon Lamb, the author of "Packaging Girlhood: Rescuing Our 
Daughters From Marketersb Schemes." "It sort of puts mothers as 
the answers standst to blame," she says.  "It's like, `Oh, now 
mothers feel guilty if you don't sit down and watch `Sesame 
Street` and do the dishes instead!"
  Like Durham, Lamb emphasizes the influence of parents in 
general.  "We've known for a very long time that with 
eating-disordered girls and teenagers, the more their family has 
talked about looks and weight and appearance, the more that 
contributes to [disordered eating]." Just watching and discussing 
TV with their parents can lead to adolescent girlsb increased 
self-esteem and body image.
  Lamb says the message of her book is that "the parents need to 
get in there and provide a counter-discourse." She explains, "You 
can't turn off media; itbs all around them in every way, but itbs 
nice to know that your relationship makes a differenceddb None of 
which is to negate efforts to change the media: It shdnbt be one 
or the other but both, Lamb argues.
  This isn't just feel-good advice: Plenty of research has 
demonstrated that consuming media with your kids -- or 
`co-viewing,` as the research papers call it -- is crucial.  "We 
know that it's not just the adolescents who watch more TV who 
choose to self-sexualize -- it's the adolescents who identify 
with the pop stars or characters in whatever media they're 
watching that are more at risk," she says.  "So what parents can 
do with their co-viewing is to critique so that it interferes 
with that identifying with the characters."
  As the report from the American Psychological Associationbs 
Task Force on the Sexualization of Girls, which Lamb coauthored, 
points out, research has shown that adults outside the family can 
have a similar influence simply by providing a counter-narrative 
-- for example, while kids watch a TV clip showing stereotypical 
gender roles, an experimenter makes a remark contradicting the 
stereotypes and the kids are more likely to express "greater 
acceptance of nontraditional gender roles."
  These discussions are not only effective but "actually 
necessary at this point," says Durham.  "Otherwise, children are 
just going to be absorbing these messages without any 
counter-messages or countervailing information, where parents 
might be pointing out the profit motives of the media and the 
ways in which sexuality especially is constructed in order to 
support those profit motives."
  Of course the catch is that parents are as subject to similar 
cultural influences as their kids.  As Dunham says, "Sexuality in 
American culture today is an impossible regressive standard, and 
it doesn't understand sex as part of a holistic concept of 
personhood." Freeing adults from that regressive standard may 
ultimately free kids, too.