The main aim of this dissertation is to discuss the way women negotiate the cultural meaning of hair loss, alopecia, as a result of undergoing chemotherapy, and to understand, accordingly, how cancer's cultural effects regarding women can be deeply different from those of men. Very few studies have been done about the cultural impact and resonance of alopecia. It is often regarded as "secondary" to other effects of chemotherapy. Because, in many cultures, head hair for women expresses or manifests attractiveness and power, to be bald is to be deprived of the ability to fit into society, whether in the public or private sphere. The study examines the representation of such women in the media, audience/subject responses to these representations, and interrogates women's identities and representations in terms of Laura Mulvey's theory of the male gaze. Women who have experienced chemotherapy-induced alopec ia were interviewed in this regard. Other contributive feminist, cultural and/or media studies works, such as those by Suzanna Walters, Susan Bordo, Naomi Wolf, Donna Haraway, Stuart Hall, Kimberle Crenshaw, and Judith Butler, help facilitate the analysis. From these perspectives, a historical analysis takes into consideration the symbolic dimension of hair, especially women's head hair, within Western cultural history, particularly in France and a multicultural America. In addition, a textual analysis looks at women, cancer, and hair loss as represented in popular culture characters and personalities. The study insists on the necessity for women to resist to the culture industries and deconstruct the male gaze, as well as the female gaze, which can both contribute to, and perpetuate women's objectification. / Includes bibliography. / Dissertation (Ph.D.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2015. / FAU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Collection

Researchers have identified the need to explore the context in which disordered eating is a reasonable response to violence and socio-cultural expectations, and the need for prevention programs that link fat phobia with other forms of oppression (Burstow, 1992; Herman, 1997; Orbach, 1994; Piran, 1999; Sesan, 1994; Steiner-Adair, 1994, Thompson, 1992). To date, the House of Mirrors Community Development Pilot Project (the "HOM") is the only community-based program in Canada that addresses these issues. The HOM is a visual arts installation of twenty-six full-length mirrors onto which women, girls and artists of various cultures, ages, and body types portrayed how violence and fat phobia have impacted their lives. The purpose of this multiple method study was to assess the efficacy of the HOM as a facilitator of working relationships between the health, business, art, and education sectors in Campbell River, B.C. The process was documented in two focus group interviews with five members of the HOM Subcommittee and in a survey of the HOM subcommittee and the Eating Disorder Program Advisory Committee. Evaluating the project's effectiveness distinguished different levels of community involvement as connections, relationships, and partnerships. The evaluation highlights differences between prevention and community development initiatives and the need for an emphasis on partnership building in social work. This knowledge will be used to inform future policy and practice decisions.

The purpose of this study was to develop and validate a self-esteem inventory for Thai college women. Research questions included whether or not the developed inventory proved to be unidimensional or multidimensional and, if the latter proved to be the case, how many dimensions underlie the construct. The item pool consisted of 70 self-esteem statements derived from the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Inventory, the Coopersmith Self-Esteem Inventory (Adult Form), and items developed for this investigation. Responses to each item were based upon a four point, Likert-type scale. The Delphi technique was applied as the content validation method. As a result of the Delphi process, 68 items were retained and used as a pilot study instrument. The pilot study was conducted among 70 college- age women in Bangkok, Thailand. Based upon item discrimination criteria, 52 items were selected for the final test instrument. The reliability of the pilot study instrument was determined to be +.91, based upon the Hoyt-Stunkard method. The 52-item instrument was then administered to 531 college-age female students in Bangkok, Thailand. Internal consistency reliability was +.94. Factor analysis was utilized to establish construct validity, to determine the dimensionality of the self-esteem instrument, and to identify the number of latent factors related to self-esteem. The concept of self-esteem was found to be multidimensional. The final 36-item instrument which resulted from this study was assessed by Hoyt-Stunkard analysis of variance to assure its reliability. Internal consistency reliability for the final instrument was +.91. Findings revealed that seven factors which reflected characteristics of self-esteem among Thai women were clustered significantly. These factors consisted of: 1) sense of family relations, 2) sense of self-worth, 3) sense of adequacy, 4) sense of competence, 5) sense of efficacy, 6) sense of confidence, and 7) sense of social and peer relations. Conclusions and implications derived from the study will provide a contribution to educational and psychological fields and to related women studies. / Graduation date: 1993

Researchers have identified the need to explore the context in which disordered eating is a reasonable response to violence and socio-cultural expectations, and the need for prevention programs that link fat phobia with other forms of oppression (Burstow, 1992; Herman, 1997; Orbach, 1994; Piran, 1999; Sesan, 1994; Steiner-Adair, 1994, Thompson, 1992). To date, the House of Mirrors Community Development Pilot Project (the "HOM") is the only community-based program in Canada that addresses these issues. The HOM is a visual arts installation of twenty-six full-length mirrors onto which women, girls and artists of various cultures, ages, and body types portrayed how violence and fat phobia have impacted their lives. The purpose of this multiple method study was to assess the efficacy of the HOM as a facilitator of working relationships between the health, business, art, and education sectors in Campbell River, B.C. The process was documented in two focus group interviews with five members of the HOM Subcommittee and in a survey of the HOM subcommittee and the Eating Disorder Program Advisory Committee. Evaluating the project's effectiveness distinguished different levels of community involvement as connections, relationships, and partnerships. The evaluation highlights differences between prevention and community development initiatives and the need for an emphasis on partnership building in social work. This knowledge will be used to inform future policy and practice decisions. / Arts, Faculty of / Social Work, School of / Graduate

Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree Master of Technology: Graphic Design, Durban University of Technology, Durban, South Africa, 2014. / The aim of this study was to investigate how images of women in the media that espouse women’s empowerment can indeed have the opposite effect and may even contribute to lowered self-esteem in women. To this end, this project is intended to explore issues such as body image and image manufacture in order to find a possible answer to the question of what is ‘real beauty’ in the South African context. A semiotic approach seeking to review the ways in which women are seen through visual communicative images was undertaken. This visual research revealed the importance of the ‘gendered gaze’ at the centre of issues that relate to self-esteem. An in-depth analysis of the literature, pertaining to self-esteem, interrogated the works of Naomi Wolf, John Berger and Susie Orbach, amongst others. This was carried out in order to understand more about how the dictates of consumerism pervade the work of the style industries. These sectors are well supported by the diet, food and cosmetic surgery industries who tend to effectively increase and add to a sense of body related insecurities. In addition, content analysis of selected South African editions of Cosmopolitan magazine was conducted. The images described represents a significant development period in the emergence of certain beauty ideals in South Africa. The British Unilever marketing campaign, The Dove Campaign For Real Beauty, was used as a base model for the applied design component of this study. In addition an action research approach was employed through a series of interviews and questionnaires directed at mostly female participants in South Africa. This method revealed that self-esteem issues have far reaching implications, affecting women of all ages. As a response to the perceived need for a South African based campaign, this research project informed the development of The Sisterhood Self-Esteem Crusade. In contrast to The Dove Campaign For Real Beauty which was created to promote increased sales of beauty products, The Sisterhood Self-Esteem Crusade’s focus is to interrogate and raise awareness of self-esteem. Underpinning this was an attempt to build confidence, cascade new ways of understanding and to propagate sense making, informed through action research, amongst South African women.

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between exercise duration and level of disordered eating, physical self-esteem, and endorsement of societal mores about attractiveness. Two hundred twenty-nine female college students completed the Bulimia-Test Revised, the Physical Self Perception Profile, the Beliefs About Attractiveness Questionnaire, and a demographic questionnaire. Subjects were classified into one of four levels of exercise duration based on the number of hours they reported engaging in planned exercise per week. Significant differences were identified among the four exercise groups in relation to physical self-esteem. The amount of exercise activity individuals engaged in per week, however, was not indicative of their eating disorder symptomatology or beliefs about attractiveness.

In this study, effects of facial self-reflection and complexity of self on physiological responses were investigated. Skin conductance levels were measured during baseline and neutral conditions, then under a self-focusing condition provided by mirror reflection of the face. Subjects completed measures of self-complexity, depressive affect, self-esteem, anxiety and body image satisfaction. Eye tracking data was collected during the mirror condition. Results showed a significant effect of mirror self-reflection on physiological reactivity as measured by differences between mirror and baseline mean responses. Pre-test depressive affect was correlated with low self-esteem but not with self-complexity. Self-complexity was negatively correlated with orientation to physical appearance and positively correlated with greater differences between baseline and mirror mean reactivity. Self-complexity and depressive affect did not significantly predict physiological reactivity, although a trend was found for the influence of each variable. Post-hoc analyses showed significant group differences for both self-complexity and depressive affect on physiological reactivity, although the influence of self-complexity was in the unexpected direction. Results of this study are consistent with general findings that negative self-esteem, anxiety and depression are strongly correlated. In addition, a strong correlation was found between negative self-esteem and dissociative symptoms. Exploratory analyses of eye tracking data found no significant relations among personality variables and percent of time looking at facial image, although some trends were found. Trends for a relation of self-complexity with time looking at facial image, negative evaluation of appearance in the mirror, and less focus on physical appearance suggest a component in the domain of self-complexity related to physical appearance. Clearly, self-complexity has a number of interrelated dimensions and remains a challenging area of study. In addition, the combination of eye tracking and physiological measurement is a relatively new area of study that shows promise for continued investigation.

This dissertation explores the making of and research for the film, Fattitude, a social justice based documentary that looks to awaken viewers to the reality of weight bias in media representation. This dissertation reviews the filmmaking process and then engages with the nature of stereotypes about fat bodies. Deeply tied to feminist and fat studies theory, the work here seeks to categorize and shape the understanding of weight bias in the media by linking fat tropes to clearly understood images of oppression, for example the monstrous, the fool, they hypersexual and the asexual. The work also seeks to present theory on the nature of creating media representations of fatness that are not oppressive – making note of current media created by grassroots movements for body acceptance and fat positivity. / Includes bibliography. / Dissertation (Ph.D.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2017. / FAU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Collection

The purpose of the study is to explore the life experiences, identities, and self-esteem of a group of Mexican women who attend Even Start, a family literacy program. The study also focuses on the effect that the program has on the women's self-identities. I chose qualitative research considering I was interested in their phenomenological experience. In order to gather data I interviewed ten women, conducted a focus group with the women who were not interviewed, and did participant observation while the women were in class. The Mexican women I interviewed came to this country hoping to improve their socioeconomic status. Most of them had relatives in the US and the support that they gave them made it easier for them to come and get established. As a result of being away from their people and their culture, they had a hard time, particularly at the beginning. Their illegal status and the fact that they didn't speak English complicated things even more. In spite of the many difficulties they had to face, their experiences in this country have allowed them to improve their socioeconomic situation and to achieve greater levels of independence. In regards to their self-esteem, most of my informants have positive self-images. The few that have lower levels of self-esteem were often mistreated by caregivers and their families were dysfunctional in some way. Even though a few have lower levels of self-esteem, all my informants felt loved by their parents and other family members. Because of this and because they were raised in social environments that fostered interdependence, my informants have generally developed into responsible and reliable people who work towards their goals. Their identities mirror their society and in particular their social network. At the core of 'who they are' are traits of the identities of caregivers that through active choices (Blumstein 1991) they came to internalize. Even Start plays a crucial role in their self-identities for two main reasons. First, in the program the women are taught English which is the basic tool they need in order to communicate and move around in this country. Second, the women are around people from their country. By feeling they belong to a larger community, the women feel supported and find strategies to cope with their reality. At the same time, being around other Mexicans strengthens their Hispanic identity. The following are recommendations that could be used by Even Start to enhance the women's self-esteem. (1) Incorporate more one-on-one activities to enable students to learn at their own pace and to help participants with special needs to work without feeling a sense of pressure. (2) Provide the women with the opportunity to improve their literacy skills in Spanish and to strengthen their knowledge in basic areas. (3) Include activities that would allow the participants to release stress and thus to improve their ability to concentrate. (4) Provide the students with skills that will enable them to find jobs or get promoted. Although the literature on self-identities was useful to conducting this research, the fact that scholars have approached the topic mainly from an intellectual perspective has resulted in an understanding of the self often disconnected from reality. Among the main contributions of this research is the realization that adult experiences such as migration and participation in a literacy program play a crucial role in people's self-esteem and identities. / Graduation date: 2004

Various researchers (e.g., Copeland, 1977; Foster,1973; and Dickson, 1993) have theorized that due to negative self-imagery and the lack of eligible Black men, Black women's self-concept suffers as a result of "losing" potential Black partners to White women. The purpose of the present study was to empirically evaluate the relationship between Black women's self-concept and their attitudes toward Black men dating White women. In addition, level of racial identity development, dating practices, and selfratings of attractiveness were examined as moderating variables. Thirty-six single Black pre-professional (PP) and 36 single Black professional (P) women completed the Demographic Questionnaire, the Tennessee Self-Concept Scale (TSCS), and the Racial Identity Scale-Version B (RIAS-B). The video vignette depicting a Black male-White female couple was then introduced, and the TSCS was administered for a second time. The results indicated that self-concept of the sample was not influenced by viewing a video of a Black male-White female couple. Moreover, level of satisfaction with physical appearance was not correlated with self-concept. In addition, PP women tended to be unsure of their Black identity while P women were less confused and more comfortable with their Black identity. The effects of Black male-White female relationships on Black women is in its exploratory stage and more research is needed in this area. / Department of Psychological Science