Why 6-Year-Old Girls Want to Be Sexy [View all]

[redqueen]

http://www.livescience.com/21609-self-sexualization-young-girls.html

Most girls as young as 6 are already beginning to think of themselves as sex objects, according to a new study of elementary school-age kids in the Midwest.

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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. In 2007, the American Psychological Association sounded the alarm in a report on the sexualization of girls. It documented consequences of self-objectification and sexualization that have been identified in mainly college-age women, ranging from distractibility during mental tasks and eating disorders to reduced condom use and fewer women pursuing careers in math and science. Starr and her colleagues wrote that they expected similar outcomes in younger adolescents and girls.

The APA report, which inspired the new study, cited widespread sexualization of women in popular culture. "In study after study, findings have indicated that women more often than men are portrayed in a sexual manner … and are objectified," the APA authors wrote. "These are the models of femininity presented for young girls to study and emulate."

The authors cited examples like "advertisements (e.g. the Sketchers naughty and nice ad that featured Christina Aguilera dressed as a schoolgirl in pigtails, with her shirt unbuttoned, licking a lollipop), dolls (e.g. Bratz dolls dressed in sexualized clothing such as miniskirts, fishnet stockings and feather boas), clothing (e.g. thong underwear sized for 7- to 10-year-olds, some printed with slogans such as 'wink wink'), and television programs (e.g. a televised fashion show in which adult models in lingerie were presented as young girls)." Parents, teachers and peers were also cited as influencing girls' sexualized identities.

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