Are Barbie dolls affecting the mental image girls set for themselves?
As a hardcore Barbie girl growing up, I don’t believe that Barbie dolls are largely to blame for this image nonsense. My sister and I grew pretty much “tomboys” but we really loved Barbies and making them up. However, we never developed image issues to the extremities that people today claim (and we mostly had the twist-n-turn waist dolls with a tiny waist and huge breasts!), such as becoming bulimic, anorexic, obsessive, depressed over our image, etc. My parents never tried to make us look mega-girly skinny, or “pretty.” Yes, as we got older, we became more conscious about appearances, but that doesn’t mean that it took over our lives. I think that parents and particularly older adolescent or adult people in a girl’s life have major influence over a child, especially when it comes to looks. This influence can be indirect in attitude towards anything (in this case, make-up, dieting, clothes, excessive exercise, etc.), critiquing of other people, basically, the way they look and act. Pa
