The Effect Of Media Exposure On Body Image

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The Effect of Media Exposure on Body Image
Vanessa Vicens
DePaul University

Results As a recap, we passed out our survey in print form to DePaul students. We collected and included a total of 42 participants surveys, 69% of which were females and 31% male. They were all between the ages of 18-24 with one outlier who was 37 years old. The mean and median ages were both 21. The standard deviation of their ages was 2.79. Finally, they were all full time students and single/never married.
Our first hypothesis was to show the correlation between media exposure and body image. In order to test this we used the Pearson test. The r= -.086 and p= .586 which meant that the correlation was very weak and going in a negative direction. We wanted to prove that when media consumption increases, body image decreases but our results for this test we insignificant. The mean number of hours per week individuals were consumed by media, television shows, social networks, magazines, etc., was 3.283, the median was 26.75, and the standard deviation was 24.18.
Our next hypothesis was to show the correlation between religiosity and body image. In this test we again used Pearson. The r= .157 and p= .322 which meant the correlation was also weak, however going in a positive direction. We wanted to show that when religiosity increases, body image also increases, but once again, our results were insignificant. When we ran the results for the religiosity portion of our survey, the mean was 1.90, median was 2.07, and the standard deviation was .98.
In order to test our next hypothesis about the relationship between gender and body image we used a standard t-test. The mean for the females was 1.98 and their standard deviation was .217. For the males, the mean was 1.97 and their standard deviation was .229. The t(40)= .099, p= .922. The mean difference was not significant which resulted in this t-test to be insignificant, as well. The men and females had almost identical results on how they view their own body image.
The last hypothesis we wanted to test was how body image was affected among a multitude of different races. Here we ran a one-way ANOVA taking a look at all races provided on the survey. Whites had a mean of 1.95 and a standard deviation of .19. Blacks had a mean of 2.09 and a standard deviation of .22. Hawaiians had a mean of 2.00 with no standard deviation. Asians had a mean of 2.04 and a standard deviation of 2.6. Alaskan Natives had a mean of 2.00 with no standard deviation. Individuals who said they were of another race not listed above had a mean of 2.00 and standard deviation of .53. Finally, those who stated that they were of two or more races had a mean of 1.84 and a standard deviation of 2.6. The F(6, 35)= .623, p= .711. This was the only test that we ran which had a significant result. We proved that those that stated were of Black race, had the lowest issues with body image. Ultimately, they were satisfied with their body image. As for those who were of two or more races, they had the highest problem with body image.
Discussion
Based off of our findings throughout this research project, we realized that three of our four tests were insignificant. There was no significance when we correlated media exposure and body image, religiosity and body image, and formulated a t-test between gender and body image. However, when we ran the one-way ANOVA, we realized that Black individuals tend to have the highest body satisfaction and those with two or