“I know why I have the scars that I do, and the bottom line is that I need them to exist”: Cancer treatment and women’s body image

With October being Breast Cancer Awareness month, we revisit this great post exploring the impact of breast cancer treatment on women's body image. 

The month of October is a time when charities, individuals, brands and businesses in the UK raise awareness of diagnosis and treatment of breast cancer. Breast cancer is the most common cancer affecting women in the UK, and in any one month around 5000 women will be diagnosed with the disease (Breast Cancer Care, 2018). Surgery, chemotherapy, radiotherapy and hormone therapy are used to treat women affected, and cancer survival has doubled in the last 40 years (Cancer Research UK, 2018).  

Procedures and therapies impact on women’s bodies physically and emotionally as they experience the changes caused by the disease and treatments.  Women might find it difficult to come to terms with a body that differs from idealised media images, and previous work on women’s body image and well-being after cancer treatment has focussed mostly on the negative impacts (e.g. Baucom, Porter&  Kirby, 2006). To understand more fully women’s experiences of cancer treatment and body image from their own perspectives, and to enable reports of both positive and negative experiences, we gave women space to report anything they felt was relevant.  We did not want to assume that the experience would be wholly negative, and so we used methods that enabled women to share as much as they were comfortable with, and in their own words.

Study 1: An Analysis of Women’s Written Accounts

Design and Methods

Our first study (Grogan & Mechan, 2016) was an investigation of women’s experiences of mastectomy with and without reconstruction/augmentation. We focused in particular on younger women (aged 45 years or under at diagnosis) who have been underrepresented in research on women’s experiences of mastectomy in the past (Holland, Archer, and Montague, 2014) and our key question was What are the impacts of mastectomy on younger women’s body image?

Image: Cancer Research UK

Women were invited to take part in the study through a UK-based online support network. This network is only open to young women with a diagnosis of breast cancer, and the second author is a member of this online group. Forty-nine women, aged 29-53 years (mean age 39 years) who had had bilateral (n = 8) or unilateral (n = 41) mastectomy took part in the study. 

To encourage disclosure and ensure that women felt comfortable discussing their experiences, we asked participants to complete a series of open-ended questions anonymously through an online questionnaire. As part of these questions, women were asked “In addition to the removal of the cancer, please share with us what was important to you when you were advised or decided (prophylactic) to have one or both of your breast removed”, and “How do you feel about your body image currently, has this changed since diagnosis and if so how has it changed?”  Thematic analysis was used to identify themes.

Findings

One key theme was the desire to survive, which dominated women’s experiences at the early stages from diagnosis to mastectomy. Women distanced themselves from the infected parts of their breasts, which were objectified and seen as separate from their well bodies. After treatment, many women felt self-conscious about their changed bodies, though others reported that having good levels of body confidence before they had cancer treatment protected them against some of the more negative impacts. 

Many had renegotiated how they should be treated as women “I am who I am and I don’t go out to impress people” and recognised that they would need to be realistic and habituate to their new, changed bodies:  “I'd obviously prefer to be how I was but had no choice but to have surgery so am just accepting of the scars and reconstruction”. For some participants, getting to recognise and feel comfortable with their post-mastectomy bodies was challenging, and some were concerned about showing their scars. Others took a pragmatic view, seeing scarring as a necessary result of treatment that had enabled them to survive, “I know why I have the scars that I do, and the bottom line is that I need them to exist”. Some women even reported feeling proud of their scars as these represented their successful ‘battle’ for survival “My scars are my war wounds of life. I don’t hide away from them. I'm proud of them. Yes my breasts are different and not natural but that doesn't change who I am”.

Study 2: Focus Group with Women Who Have Experienced Cancer Treatment

Design and Methods

In our second study (Grogan, Mechan, Persson, Finley, & Hall, 2017) , we used focus group methodology to give women some control over the agenda, leaving  space for unexpected findings  and positive as well as negative constructions of the body. Our key question was How do women construct body image following cancer treatment?

Women were invited through an advertisement placed on a UK cancer charity website, and were asked to take part in a study to investigate stories and personal experiences of cancer diagnosis and treatment. Four women aged 32-67 years who had experienced cancer treatment for breast or bowel cancer took part in one focus group, where they were encouraged to talk freely about their experiences of cancer treatment.

Our analysis aimed to help us to understand how women who had undergone breast or bowel cancer treatment reflected on their everyday experiences, and in particular, we were interested in how these women’s talk resisted social norms around women’s bodies and cancer. 

Findings

Women identified both positive and negative impacts, talking about concealing their bodies and illness from public interest and judgment, sometimes wanting to blend in by not drawing attention to themselves in social situations, and also about developing increased trust in, and acceptance of, their changed bodies. Women aimed to present their post-cancer bodies as positive whilst not necessarily feeling comfortable with their naked bodies. Participants spoke about the use of cosmetics, wigs, prosthetic devices, different types of clothing or alternative ways of wearing clothing in order to hide any perceived body imperfections, and also spoke about the management of their naked bodies by “hiding” them in public spaces such as public changing rooms.  The degree to which women reported engaging in these activities did not necessarily relate to the level of scarring. 

Despite issues with the management of their bodies in public, some participants talked openly about how they had developed renewed trust and respect for their bodies as a result of cancer treatment and survival.  For instance one woman talked about having “a really huge respect” for her body, and another discussed how she has developed “trust” and “new found respect” for her body since cancer treatment. All participants indicated they accepted their post-cancer bodies. For instance, “I sort of, I have accepted sort of who I am“.

Summary and Conclusions 

Women who completed our online questionnaire and who took part in our focus group presented much more positive stories than we had expected based on work suggesting that mastectomy and other cancer-related treatments produce mainly negative impacts on women’s body image and wellbeing. Women had been inspired to create new body identities as a result of cancer treatment, and some women said that their scars were like war wounds, symbols of survival, suggesting a good level of perceived control and self-efficacy.  Women used acceptance discourses and talked about renegotiating gender identity. In both studies, we were struck by the variability in accounts of women experiencing a relatively similar life event. It is therefore important that health professionals and others do not expect homogenous patterns of negative responses in women who have had cancer treatment, so that they are able to provide tailored support if and when needed. 

Sarah Grogan is Professor of Psychology, Health and Wellbeing at Manchester Metropolitan University. She is interested in body image and links between body image and health-related behaviours such as smoking, UV protection, and alcohol consumption as well as media and other social influences on body image. 

Jayne Mechan is Senior Lecturer in Fashion Technology in the Manchester Fashion Institute, Manchester Metropolitan University. She is interested in mechanisms of body representation and diversity within the fashion industry. 

References

Baucom, D., Porter, L.& Kirby, J. (2006). Psychosocial issues confronting young women with breast cancer. Breast Disease,23, 103-113. https://content.iospress.com/articles/breast-disease/bd000209

Breast Cancer Care (2018).  Facts and statistics. Available at: https://www.breastcancercare.org.uk/about-us/media/facts-statistics(accessed 26 August 2018)

 Cancer Research UK (2018) Cancer statistics for the UK. Available at: https://www.cancerresearchuk.org/health-professional/cancer-statistics-for-the-uk#heading-Zero(accessed  10 August 2018).

Grogan, S. &  Mechan, J. (2016). Body Image after Mastectomy: A Thematic Analysis of Younger Women’s Written Accounts. Journal of Health Psychology. E-pub ahead of print 24 Feb 2016. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1359105316630137

Grogan, S., Mechan, J., Persson, S., Finlay, S., & Hall, M. (2017). I’ve got a very dichotomous difference in the way that I perceive myself”: Positive and negative constructions of body image following cancer treatment. Journal of Health Psychology. E-pub: https://doi.org/10.1177/1359105317730896

Holland, F., Archer, S., & Montague, J. (2016). Younger women’s experiences of deciding against delayed breast reconstruction post-mastectomy following breast cancer: An interpretative phenomenological analysis, Journal of Health Psychology, 21(8), 1688-1699. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1359105314562085

Traditional media disclaimer labels are ineffective at improving women’s body image; But what about social media disclaimers?

Earlier this year, Norway passed a law requiring that social media influencers who edit their appearance on promotional posts must add a disclaimer label declaring this editing. In this excellent post from 2018, Jasmine Fardouly explores whether such disclaimers are likely to be effective:

(For more recent research with similar findings, see Livingston, Holland & Fardouly's 2020 article in Body Image journal)

Whether you are reading a magazine, scrolling through social media, or just walking past shop fronts or advertisements, it is likely that you will come across glamorous images of thin women living a seemingly perfect lifestyle. These images generally promote a very narrow beauty ideal that is unattainable for most women. These images are also often edited, using appearance-enhancing lighting and photo editing filters, apps, and programs. Thus, the beauty ideal being promoted in these images is not real or achievable.

Decades of research suggests that looking at these idealised images can make women feel bad about their body and increase negative mood (Grabe, Ward, & Hyde, 2008), particularly for women who are already highly concerned about their body. This may be because women compare their own appearance to the women in the images and judge themselves to be less attractive and/or because these images encourage women to internalise the societal beauty ideal.

Government bodies and policy makers are becoming more aware of the prevalence and detrimental effects of body image concerns within their communities and are looking for ways to reduce these concerns. One preventative strategy that has attracted considerable interest has been the use of disclaimer labels in advertisements, which inform viewers when images have been digitally altered. In 2012, Israel passed a law requiring all advertisers to disclose when their photos of models have been retouched, and France introduced similar legislation in 2015. The underlying rationale behind the use of disclaimers is that by informing viewers that the image is unrealistic, viewers will choose to engage in fewer comparisons with the people in the image, which would reduce the negative body image outcomes that arise from exposure to such idealised images (Bury, Tiggemann, & Slater, 2017; Paraskeva, Lewis-Smith, & Diedrichs, 2017). 

Despite the increasing adoption of laws around the world encouraging the use of disclaimer labels, the existing evidence suggests that they are largely ineffective in improving women’s body image (e.g., Ata, Thompson, & Small, 2013; Bury, Tiggemann, & Slater, 2016; Bury et al., 2017; Tiggemann, Brown, Zaccardo, & Thomas, 2017). These results demonstrate that disclaimers do not produce their intended effect, suggesting that the introduction of ‘Photoshop’ laws may well be a pointless endeavour in addressing body image concerns.

Similar to the recommendations for traditional media, a recent report by the Royal Society for Public Health in the UK recommended that social media platforms add disclaimer labels to images that have been edited online in an attempt to reduce any negative impact of those images on users’ body image (Royal Society for Public Health, 2017). While previous research suggests that attaching disclaimer labels to traditional media images is ineffective, it is unclear whether or not this holds true for social media images.

Unlike traditional media disclaimers that are posted from an external standpoint (e.g., “Warning: This image has been digitally altered”), people can add self-disclaimers to the comments or captions attached to their idealised and edited images on social media. Indeed in 2015, Australian teenager and social media influencer Essena O’Neill made headlines across the globe for her decision to quit social media and to re-caption a number of her Instagram photos, critiquing the staged and contrived nature of social media, and society’s over-emphasis on women’s appearance (Hunt, 2015). Unlike idealised traditional media images that are primarily staged and edited by third parties (e.g., professional photographer and graphic designer), idealised social media images are often staged and edited by the person in the image. Therefore, posting self-disclaimer comments on idealised social media images is likely to influence the impressions viewers form of the user. In regards to Essena’s case, while she did receive some praise in the media for speaking out about the industry and critiquing society’s beauty standards (Hunt, 2015), she also received a barrage of criticism, with many claiming that she was not authentic, and that she had quit social media purely for the attention (McClusky, 2016). 

Together with my colleague Dr Elise Holland, I conducted an experimental study examining the influence of self-disclaimer comments attached to idealised social media images on women’s body image, mood, and impressions of the person who posted the images/disclaimers on social media. Similar to the research on traditional media disclaimers, we found that social media self-disclaimers were ineffective at improving women’s body image and reducing negative mood (Fardouly & Holland, 2018). Disclaimers did, however, impact perceptions of the women posting them, with participants forming a less positive impression of the women who attached disclaimer comments to their social media images.

Disclaimers may be ineffective at reducing women’s body dissatisfaction because they do not prevent women from being exposed to the idealised image (Paraskeva et al., 2017). Regardless of whether women are informed that an image is digitally edited or staged, the woman’s appearance in the image is being portrayed as ideal and attractive, and thus women may continue to internalize that ideal and compare their appearance to the woman in the image. Therefore, researchers and policy makers could focus their efforts on other techniques to improve women’s body image. There may not be an easy and quick way to reduce the impact of idealized images on body image, so we may need to work towards reducing the number of idealized images that we are exposed to in the first place. Further research is needed to find effective techniques to both improve body image and change the media environment to which people are exposed.

 

Jasmine Fardouly is a Research Fellow working at UNSW in Sydney. Her research focuses on social influences on body image, particularly the influence of social media and social comparisons, and also on positive uses of social media for wellbeing. 

References 

Ata, R. N., Thompson, J. K., & Small, B. J. (2013). Effects of exposure to thin-ideal media images on body dissatisfaction: Testing the inclusion of a disclaimer versus warning label. Body Image, 10, 472-480. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.bodyim.2013.04.004

Bury, B., Tiggemann, M., & Slater, A. (2016). The effect of digital alteration disclaimer labels on social comparison and body image: Instructions and individual differences. Body Image, 17, 136-142. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.bodyim.2016.03.005

Bury, B., Tiggemann, M., & Slater, A. (2017). Disclaimer labels on fashion magazine advertisements: Does timing of digital alteration information matter? Eating Behaviors, 25, 18-22. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.eatbeh.2016.08.010

Fardouly, J., & Holland, E. (2018). Social media is not real life: The effect of attaching disclaimer-type labels to idealized social media images on women’s body image and mood. New Media & Society. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1461444818771083

Grabe, S., Ward, L. M., & Hyde, J. S. (2008). The role of the media in body image concerns among women: A meta-analysis of experimental and correlational studies. Psychological Bulletin, 134, 460-476. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0033-2909.134.3.460

Hunt, E. (2015). Essena O’Neill quits Instagram claiming social media is ‘not real life’. The Guardian. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/media/2015/nov/03/instagram-star-essena-oneill-quits-2d-life-to-reveal-true-story-behind-images

McClusky, M. (2016). Instagram star Essena O’Neill breaks her silence on quitting social media. Time Magazine. Retrieved from http://time.com/4167856/essena-oneill-breaks-silence-on-quitting-social-media/

Paraskeva, N., Lewis-Smith, H., & Diedrichs, P. C. (2017). Consumer opinion on social policy approaches to promoting positive body image: Airbrushed media images and disclaimer labels. Journal of Health Psychology, 22, 164-175. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1359105315597052

Royal Society for Public Health. (2017). #StatusOfMind: Social media and young people's mental health and wellbeing. Retrieved from https://www.rsph.org.uk/our-work/policy/social-media-and-young-people-s-mental-health-and-wellbeing.html

Tiggemann, M., Brown, Z., Zaccardo, M., & Thomas, N. (2017). “Warning: This image has been digitally altered”: The effect of disclaimer labels added to fashion magazine shoots on women’s body dissatisfaction. Body Image, 21, 107-113. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.bodyim.2017.04.001

Seeing the Self Through Selfies: Beauty, Selfies and Cancer

When I was diagnosed with Stage 2 Breast Cancer two days before my 28th birthday, the first question I asked was “Am I going to lose my hair?” “Probably,” the nurse answered, as I felt the ground fall away from under my feet.

My hair wasn’t the best hair in the world (it had recently recovered from a horrendous, self-imposed quarantine fringe), but it was still mine. Well-meaning comments of “it will grow back” and “it is only temporary,” whilst being true, delegitimised the very real sense of grief I felt. Every time I touched it in the lead up to my first chemotherapy session, I imagined it not being there and felt a lurch in my stomach. I couldn’t imagine my face without eyebrows or eyelashes, and in my obsessive reading about side-effects, I convinced myself that my nails were going to fall off. Of course, being bald temporarily was preferable to dying, but classic media images of cancer patients haunted me. It felt like my identity was being stripped away, leaving me with nothing but illness.

Beauty practices and selfie-culture are often positioned as symbols of narcissism and vanity, with writers like Jonathan Freedland stating that “the selfie is surely the ultimate emblem of the age of narcissism” and a Swansea University study contending that selfies “fuel narcissism”. In 2021, a journal article published in the Psychology of Popular Media concluded that “grandiose and exhibitionistic aspects of narcissism are tied to selfie-taking” . Likewise, frequent headlines such as “A Generation of Self-Absorbed Social Media ‘Influencers’ Needs to Grow Up” reinforce the image of a failed generation lost to their phones. The media is particularly keen to scoff at young women who participate in taking pictures of themselves or make money online from beauty, with Gaby Hinsliff writing that young women’s association with narcissism may stem from their “overindulging in all kinds of navel-gazing, from the cult of “self-care” (taking time out to cosset yourself) to compulsive posting of selfies.” 

Such perspectives are overly simplistic and incredibly gendered, erasing the ways that make-up, fashion and selfies enable women and non-binary people to cultivate their identity. Indeed, in her fantastic article for Gal-Dem, Leah Cowen explores the ways that self-portraiture became an “important tool” throughout the Renaissance for “women and other marginalised artists.” She notes that, despite women’s bodies frequently being depicted by male Renaissance painters, women were not allowed to attend life-drawing classes, consequently turning to self-portraiture as a form of self-expression. Cowen writes that selfies are similar to self-portraits in that they are a low-cost method of shaping the self, arguing that:

[…] A whole load of boring sexist and heteronormative discourse around selfies attempts to suggest that selfie-takers are insecure and seeking external validation. This jars with my largely anecdotal hypothesis that the vast majority of selfies don’t get posted online. I’d wager that most selfies simply sit quietly in private albums on people’s phones. They are scrolled through from time to time for a quick reminder of aesthetic excellence, much like dusty old dukes who had oil paintings of themselves hanging in their bedrooms. 

For me, it has been a lifeline. In the aftermath of my diagnosis, I watched countless YouTube and TikTok beauty vlogs providing tips for women undergoing chemotherapy on the best products for dealing with dull skin, flaky nails and rashes. I poured over Etsy for the best turbans and wigs, starting a collection in an array of colours and lengths. Perhaps the best decision I made was to get my eyebrows micro-bladed after reading an article that suggested this helps with maintaining face shape after hair-loss. Recently, I noticed that my eyebrow hair had mostly fallen out, but I could only tell by looking very closely. After my hair started to fall out in clumps in the bath, I put on new make-up and earrings, then ceremoniously shaved my head and took a selfie to send to my friends. 

It’s worth noting that I was only able to experiment with my style due to having a secure job. The indignity of losing your hair, eyebrows and eyelashes (among other side effects) is lessened significantly when you can have ‘fun’ with your appearance, an experience not afforded to people forced onto statuary sick pay (a pitiful £96.35 per week) or in insecure employment. There are prescription wigs available on the NHS and great charities like Wigs for Heroes which provide grants for women to purchase wigs and other items, but that doesn’t answer the question of why our government thinks it is acceptable for people to face potential financial ruin whilst battling cancer.

Of course, there are problematic beauty structures; historically, Whiteness and thinness has been synonymous with attractiveness, a default position that is often replicated in the mainstream media. But, engaging with beauty practices and selfie culture as a method for enjoying one’s own appearance can be a resistance to these standards. For example, trends like #BlackGirlMagic and #Effyourbeautystandards encourage women outside the Eurocentric beauty ideal to position themselves within “contexts of beauty, desirability and dignity.” This is not to suggest that such campaigns alone will change the racism, ableism and heteronormativity that underpins normative assumptions about beauty. Nevertheless, carving out space for bodies outside of the mainstream conceptualisation of beauty can only be positive.

Structures of femininity are innately paradoxical; women are constantly bombarded with images of beauty products, whilst simultaneously ridiculed for engaging with beauty culture. The intense backlash and ridicule of ‘the selfie’ and other examples of online beauty culture (e.g. beauty vloggers) reveals the ways that capitalism profits off women’s insecurities. Taking joy from one’s appearance, therefore, is in direct contestation with the market and expectations of femininity as existing solely for the male gaze, rather than for oneself.

For me, the end result of embracing my new appearance was significant - when I looked in the mirror, I saw myself, rather than someone with cancer.  Selfies acted as a marker of this new version of myself, hardened by my experience and comforted by my new knowledge of beauty tips and tricks. It doesn’t have to be such a drastic example to defend selfies/beauty culture though… maybe women just think they look nice and want to share that.

Dr. Amelia Morris is a Lecturer of Sociology at the University of Law in London, Bloomsbury. Her research expertise focuses around gender, the body, health, austerity and poverty. In 2019, she published ’The Politics of Weight: Feminist Dichotomies of Power in Dieting.’ Her second book, ‘Lean Times: The Body Politics of Austerity’ was co-authored with Dr. Nicola Smith at the University of Birmingham and will be submitted for review in autumn 2021.

Here Come the Boys: Make-up and Masculinity

With War Paint for Men opening a 'world-first' store selling make-up for men in London last month, we revisit this great post on make-up and masculinity from early 2019: 

I’ve become more and more interested in the advertisements that appear on my Facebook feed and what this seems to indicate about who Facebook think I am, what my interests and aspirations are. This has shifted recently from amusement at the back shavers, ear-hair clippers and baldness cures that it might be imagined would appeal to a bald middle aged man to (as the ads have become more specialized and targeted) a more critical thinking about the gendered and sexualized subject that the ad algorithm constructs and presents back to me, anchored very much around ideas of male beauty.

Photo by Jaysen Scott from Pexels (edited)

I’m discussing this in this blog because my targeted ads are currently overwhelmingly about male grooming and beauty products. This includes a number of advertisements for men’s cosmetics such as the brands Altr for Men and War Paint.  I find myself thinking about this after reading a BBC online article that asks us if men’s make-up is going ‘mainstream’. The picture that Bel Jacobs’ rather excitable article draws is one in which the difference between the contexts in which men use make-up and the potential significance of these acts tends to get lost; indeed what ‘mainstream’ means is not really very clear. So premium brands (with premium price tags) marketing make-up for men are positioned alongside male beauty bloggers like Manny Gutierrez and James Charles with their conspicuous displays of skill as make-up artists as if they are equivalent in meaning. I don’t think they are. The case for the ‘mainstreaming’ of make up for men (mainstreaming meaning I think in this context the normalizing of make-up use) is definitively made by trotting out that celebrity bell-weather, David Beckham, presented as the ideal of ‘mainstream’ masculinity, beauty, desirability.  As cover boy for LOVE Magazine, Jacobs tells us that ‘everybody’ is talking about Beckham in make up. In fact the made-up Beckham looks hardly any different to the regular version. Instead he sports a smudge of greeny-blue eyeshadow, referencing, in a whisper rather than a roar, David Bowie from the mid 70s, or David Sylvian with his full face of makeup from the early 80s, or Johnny Depp’s penchant for eyeliner in any number of promotional shots. 

Notwithstanding the hyperbole around Beckham’s latest magazine cover, it does indeed seem that make-up for men is, once again, having a moment.  The Guardian also ran a feature by Sam Wolfson in October 2018 asking ‘is make-up for men the next big beauty trend?’.

Notably, across all of the recent reportage on make-up for men the novelty of this trend is connected to the launch of the Boy de Chanel range.The line consists of only three products; a foundation, a brow pencil and a lip balm that are, rather hilariously, if imprecisely, described by Forbes as ‘revolutionary’. 

Boy de Chanel had a limited initial launch in Korea, suggesting that the market for this range is not quite as rigidly or straightforwardly located in either the West nor in Western ideals and notions of masculine beauty. For the Korean launch, the face of Boy de Chanel was actor Lee Dong Wook whose ephebic beauty attracts legions of female fans and has in addition been afforded industry recognition via the ‘Photogenic Award of the Year, 2018’ from the Korea Fashion Photographers Association. It’s instructive to compare Lee Dong Wook at Chanel to David Beckham on the cover of LOVE magazine. A hint of blue eyeshadow draws attention, peacock-like to Beckham’s otherwise rugged beauty whereas the Korean star is the very image of studied (and studiedly naturalistic) perfection. Notably the two, resolutely Caucasian, models chosen for the US launch of Boy de Chanel, Tim Schumacher and Matthew Bell, whilst not stars of popular TV, like Lee Dong Wook, have looks that speak of both youth and a kind of desexualised masculinity that is far removed from either macho posture or extravagant display. In fact taking the sex out of make-up use seems to be a key concern when aiming the product at male consumers. For instance GQ, the go-to publication for fashion conscious (and fashion cautious)men goes to some length to assuage any concerns that using make-up might in some way compromising a man’s sexuality. In a similar vein, Men’s Health, which like GQ is a publication with a very conservative vision of what masculinity is, provides handy ‘make-up tips’ for the anxious man. The message (and again I’m not convinced it’s the right one) is that for men make-up’s use value matters. Mario Abad in Men’s Health reminds us that men use make up because,  “there has to be a problem first and then a solution, so they're happy.” 

Over and above the fact that Chanel’s marketing department must be delighted by the breathless hyperbole that this extremely limited product launch has attracted, I find myself thinking about the ways in which advertisers, journalists and commentators struggle to ‘masculinise’ make-up, a product paradigmatically gendered as feminine and tethered to ideas around the tools of seduction that women control and exercise.

We should of course remember that whilst the fashion industry is in the business of promoting novelty there is nothing new about major fashion and cosmetic companies attempting to launch men’s make up lines. A decade earlier Jean Paul Gaultier did the same thing with his new defunct Monsieur line and Tom Ford also sells a limited range of cosmetics ‘for men’.

As it happens the BBC, The Guardian et al. are really rather late to the party in any case as Women’s Wear Daily were predicting this trend almost 3 years ago. The WWD article in fact has something rather more intriguing to tell us, pointing out, as it does, that in the mass market rather than prestige brands like Chanel and Tom Ford, there is a trend to bypass the gender bifurcation of make-up, with L’Oreal, Maybelline, Cover Girl and others casting male alongside female models in major brand campaigns.

So why is this a news story again at the end of 2018 and in early 2019? In the first instance pragmatics; the internet provides the conditions and opportunities to create viable businesses out of selling make-up to men. In part, this is no doubt to do with the comfort afforded that our brittle masculinity need not be compromised by approaching a sales assistant at an in-store make-up counter, surrounded by the accoutrements of femininity. Instead the purchase of make-up can be masculinized, rationalized and, crucially, anonymised.

Secondly, masculinity itself is under closer scrutiny than ever before and the male body has become a particular focus of attention across popular culture. Toxic or in crisis, heterosexual, metrosexual, lumbersexual or spornosexual, masculinity has so many connotations and associations attached to it in the 21^st century that as I’ve argued elsewhere it’s become literally saturated with meaning.

However, in the excitement of the potential to rethink gender that these developments might offer, I think it’s also important to pay attention to the pervasive gendered discourses that continue to underpin the marketing strategies and media debates that are generated around make-up for men. There is a risk of collapsing two different ways of thinking about make-up and its cultural significance; makeup as the revealer of the real you (Beckham’s eye shadow as peacockery and male sexual display, make-up bloggers revealing their creative skills and, perhaps, their sexual identities through the application of make-up) and make-up as a concealer of the real you (erasing lines, redness, blemishes and dark rings in ways that are undetectable.) The dominant discourses around make-up for men tend to fall into this latter category, and I think align themselves with a set of neoliberal ideas about individual responsibility, competition and efficiency. Make-up for men then is sold to consumers on the basis that it will provide confidence and preparedness for whatever challenges life may present (metaphors of labour and the workplace abound and the distinction between professional and private lives in this context becomes invisible.) ‘Readiness’ I think is key to understanding both the condition that men are expected to function under in the 21^stcentury and how therefore make-up is sold; HD ready for the best possible Instagram post, ready to get the job or seal the contract, ready to wear the latest fashions,and ready to attract the equally ready partner.

The issues that I’ve discussed here are some of the topics that we aim to tackle in our AHRC Research Network: Masculinity, Sex and Popular Culture. This 24-month project will explore the pervasiveness of sexualized masculine embodiment across contemporary popular culture, and set an ambitious agenda for subsequent research. The network steering group includes Begonya Enguix, Joao Florencio, Jamie Hakim, Mark McGlashan, Peter Rehberg and Florian Voros. Our first, free to attend, event in Birmingham on 3rd May 2019 will set priorities for the network by addressing contemporary concerns about men’s physical and mental well-being within the context of a sexualised culture and will focus on male body image.

You can find out more at http://www.bcu.ac.uk/masc

John Mercer is Professor of Gender and Sexuality at Birmingham City University. He researches the social and cultural construction of masculinities and has written extensively about masculinity in gay pornography. He is the Principal Investigator on the AHRC research network, Masculinity, Sex and Popular Culture and (with Clarissa Smith) is writing a book on sexualised masculinity for Routledge

How Might the Fit of Clothes Impact Women’s Body Satisfaction?

 How does it make you feel if you cannot fit into clothes in your usual size?

Interview data suggest that many of us monitor our weight by seeing how our clothes fit, and tighter clothes have been linked with body dissatisfaction.

What about when retailers do not stock clothes in your size?

New research suggests that availability of well-fitting clothes may impact on our body satisfaction.

Clothing fit and body image

UK and US women have reported that tightness of clothes is a motivator to lose weight. In many cases, clothes fit was more important than looking at themselves in mirrors or weighing themselves in prompting dieting. The fit of close-fitting garments (such as jeans) was used by many women to judge whether they had gained weight. This pattern was seen in women in a wide range of ages as seen in these quotes from participants in UK interviews (Grogan, 2021):

 “I don't look in the mirror to see how fat I am. And when I put on clothes that are tight around the waist. And the clothes that I've got that are nice but that I can't get into. That's what motivates me to get my weight down. It's clothes” (Betty, age 63 years).

 “That's the only thing that I would diet for, if I went out of my clothes size. I would have to diet, because I could never afford to replace all my clothes. If I was growing out of my clothes I would definitely try and cut down” (Sharron, age 46 years).

“I don't long to be under nine stone [126 lb] again, because I think that is an unrealistic weight for me, but I think just so that my clothes fit me nicely (Toni, age 27 years).

Recent work conducted by researchers based at Manchester Metropolitan University (Sarah Grogan, Kathryn Brownbridge, Jenny Cole, John Darby, Gillian McChesney, Paula Wren), and University of Manchester (Simeon Gill, Christopher J. Armitage, Celina Jones) has investigated how women feel about their bodies when they find it more difficult to get a good fit in clothes. We have been interested in particular at how the limited availability of well-fitting clothing for women who have larger body sizes may influence women’s body satisfaction.

The plus size clothes “problem”     

Clothing retailers tend to sell a limited range of sizes; many popular high street stores in the UK focus mainly on women’s sizes 6-18. Where retailers do sell larger sizes, they have limited stock in those sizes and they are often only available online. Luxury fashion garments tend to be restricted to particularly small sizes relative to the actual sizes of women in the UK (Aagarup, 2018), and US (McCall, 2018). Sizes above a UK 18 are often seen as “plus-size” garments, with some retailers stocking “plus-size” or “curve” ranges (e.g. Asos Curve; up to size 30) alongside their regular ranges and others specializing in plus-size clothes (e.g. Evans; sizes 14-32).

Lack of availability of larger sized clothing means that women with larger bodies may struggle to find clothes that fit well. This presents practical problems in terms of restricting women’s choice (Reardon & Grogan, 2011), and is likely to signal to women that their bodies are outside acceptable size norms leaving them dissatisfied. Eva Barlösius and Axel Phillips (2015) argue that the restriction of clothes choices for women whose bodies fall outside the industry-approved “normal-sized” body type is a form of structural weight stigmatization, and other researchers (e.g. Lewis et al., 2011) have suggested that lack of availability of clothes in larger sizes in mainstream retailers may be associated with feelings of stigmatization and body dissatisfaction.

Links between fit and body satisfaction

In interviews with 20 UK women about clothing and body image (Grogan et al., 2013), we found that all women reported monitoring their body size through clothes fit. Tighter clothes led to reduced body satisfaction, and this was the case even in women who were generally body-confident. Although women knew that size labelling was unreliable, they used clothes size as a marker for weight gain and were unhappy if clothes were too tight and did not fit as expected. For instance, one young woman (age 29 years) said “If I go into say [high street store] and I try a pair of size 10 jeans and I can’t get them past my thighs that does make me feel awful”.

In a more recent study (Grogan et al. 2020), we predicted that number of retailers stocking women’s exact size would be associated with body satisfaction and might partly explain why women higher in body mass index (BMI) tend to have lower body satisfaction (e.g. Weinberger et al., 2016). 

Eighty-five UK-based women aged 18 to 81 years with BMI ranging from 18.69 to 56.13 took part in the study. All women had been whole-body scanned at fashion events and had received printed copies of their scans, and had been weighed and their height measured. We used their scan measurements to calculate exactly how many UK online clothing retailers sold clothes that would fit their specific body measurements according to the retailers stated body measurements online. Analysis was based on online size charts from UK retailers with both bricks-and-mortar and online presences. A participant was deemed to have suitable fit offered when her bust, waist, and hip circumference were within 3 cm of the bust, waist, and hip measurements on the retailer’s size chart. 

The number of UK retailers where participants could find appropriately sized clothing ranged from 0 to 39. High BMI was linked to lower body satisfaction (which supports most other work in this area, e.g. Weinberger et al., 2016). As BMI increased, number of available shops where women could buy well-fitting clothes decreased, supporting suggestions that there is greater availability of smaller sizes in UK retailers, e.g. Aagarup (2018). Further, higher BMI may mean a difference in expected shape, where bust, waist and hip measurements (the key sizing dimensions) do not map to the proportional expectations of the retailers. Most importantly, having body measurements that matched onto available clothes sizing in more shops was a key factor in mediating the relationship between BMI and body satisfaction. Women’s age had little impact on the associations, so these are not relationships that are confined, for instance, to younger women. Our findings suggest that having a body size and shape that fits more retailers’ quite limited specifications has an impact on women’s body satisfaction.

What now for clothing retailers?

So, the key message for clothing retailers? Ensure that you cater effectively for the full range of women’s bodies, including women with larger body sizes and those whose proportions do not match the narrow expectations of your shape offerings. As well as assisting your sales, you have the potential to improve the lives of women by ensuring no one feels out of step with acceptable norms on how women’s bodies should look.

Professor Sarah Grogan is Emeritus Professor in the Department of Psychology, Manchester Metropolitan University. She is contactable on s.grogan@mmu.ac.uk.

Dr Jenny Cole is Senior Lecturer in the Department of Psychology, Manchester Metropolitan University.

Dr Simeon Gill is Senior Lecturer in the Department of Materials, University of Manchester.

Dr Kathryn Brownbridge is Senior Lecturer (Fashion Design) in Manchester Fashion Institute, Manchester Metropolitan University.

Dr John Darby is Senior Lecturer in the School of Computing Mathematics and Digital Technology, Manchester Metropolitan University.

Why Fair is Unfair in UK Quality of Life: Evidence of the Bleaching Syndrome

An upcoming documentary from the UK pop star, Leigh-Anne Pinnock, acknowledges that "colourism sits right beside racism". In this great revisited post, Ronald E Hall discusses colourism in the UK

To be dark in the UK today regardless of race is to be unfairly stigmatized in failure to meet the ideal of fair skin. To be fair and/or light-skinned, on the other hand, is to be celebrated as attractive and smart in line with the fair skin ideal. This is true for UK men, UK women, UK whites, UK blacks and other UK people of color. 

Black and Asian citizens of the UK in particular not only experience this penchant for fair skin from outside their racial group but within it as well. While the bias against darkness is most apparent in skin bleaching by women around the world, it is increasingly apparent to UK dermatologists who see patients requesting skin bleaching products.

Gina is a dark-skinned woman in her mid-twenties and a resident of the UK, born of Jamaican descent.  She is from south London where she was advised by friends to visit a shop in Peckham,where she purchased a bottle of skin lightening cream. What happened to her after using this cream is typical. However, her situation is of the more extreme variety. 

Initially Gina applied the cream to her skin two times a day before seeing immediate changes in her dark complexion. She had become noticeably fair. Enthused, she increased the application to as much as six times daily. Eventually Gina noticed changes in the skin on her thighs, legs and face that appeared to be blotches. Concerned, she sought the attention of her doctor. He diagnosed her as having adrenal gland malfunctioning, and her blood pressure had become extremely high. She almost died from her attempts to attain her desired fair skin (https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2005/oct/16/health.healthandwellbeing).

During my 30 years of studying this subject both as a student and as a professor, including visits to the UK, I have found a desire to be fair prevalent in all places among all peoples around the world touched by Western influence. Subsequently, in the most remote of places we have developed an internalized bias indicative of what I call the “bleaching syndrome.” As suggested by the “bleaching syndrome”, fair skin is perceived by those who have dark complexions as a direct means to a preferred quality of life.

A Fair Skin Quality of Life

When we think of the desire for fair skin, Black folk are the first who come to mind. However, until publication of The Color Complex in 1992 (by Russell, Wilson & Hall: revised edition in 2013), any talk of bias was a well-kept, well-known secret in the Black community. And this is despite the fact that any number of scientific investigations have established that those who have fair skin acquire more education, work at more prestigious occupations, and earn significantly higher incomes than their darker-skinned counterparts. This is a truth that prevails even in Africa and the Caribbean where Blacks exist in considerable numbers, as well as in the UK.

Each year, any number of Black and Asian women living in the UK apply bleaching creams in the hopes of reaching their desired quality of life. When they are fairer ,they expect to get better jobs, and make more money, as research suggests. And perhaps most appealing of all, they also expect greater success on the marriage market in attracting the most desirable mate. 

Belief in the positive effects of fair skin for a successful quality of life is strong. Law enforcement in the UK has seized any number of illegal bleaching cream products being shipped into the country illegally. These provide dark-skinned women with access to fair skin not under some apartheid regime or American slave era, but in emulation of the many modern-day pop stars like Beyoncé and Lil’ Kim. Dark-skinned women in the UK are convinced that the success of such pop icons. their role models, is due to their having fair skin. This creates a profitable market for bleach creams that will reach consumers legally or otherwise (https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2005/oct/16/health.healthandwellbeing). Thus, the quest for a desirable quality of life via fair skin is evidence in the UK of the bleaching syndrome.    

The Bleaching Syndrome

The bleaching syndrome has three components. In the first place, it is psychological, involving the adoption of alien ideals and the rejection of native characteristics. This means that naturally dark-skinned women in the UK will prefer fair skin as their personal ideal. Secondly, the bleaching syndrome is sociological. This means that it affects group behavior in line with these fair skin ideals. The final aspect of the bleaching syndrome is physiological. Here, individual psychology and group behavior eventually lead to the bleaching of skin for a fair complexion. These bleaching actions are not limited directly to skin but any physical attribute perceived as a stigma. Therefore, northern Asians in particular exhibit the bleaching syndrome not only in their preference for fair skin but eye shape as well. In an effort to acquire white “round eyes”, Asian citizens consider having blepharoplasty, a surgical procedure that can alter stigma of the Asian eye fold. This desire for both fair skin and eye surgery is strong evidence of the bleaching syndrome in the UK.

Blepharoplasty; before and after (Photo: User:People bios)

The Solution is Political

Asians born in India comprise the largest foreign population living in London at 9.1%. They are joined by considerable factions from Pakistan at 4.0%, and Bangladesh at 3.1%. Combined with more settled Black populations, this is a considerable number. All four groups have dark skin and make up a substantial bleaching cream market (http://www.migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/briefings/migrants-in-the-uk-an-overview/).

The solution to the bleaching syndrome will be political. The “natural hair movement” offers a good example of how we may be able to combat internalized bias for fair skin and round eyes via the bleaching syndrome. Activists committed to various causes celebrated the once stigmatized kinky hair. Today all over the world afros, dreadlocks and other forms of course hair textures are redefined such that dreadlocks are not unknown to be worn by whites in the UK as well.  

The end of the bleaching syndrome won’t be achieved by banning fair skin or taxing bleach creams. Rather, it will be by political action to challenge fair skin as the sole ideal by feminists and other activists including pop entertainment icons. Given their efforts, others will be inspired to move a generation to the rescue of darkness from the fair skin ideal. Crossing paths between those who challenge bleaching dark skin and those who celebrate dark skin will then introduce a culmination of efforts as others join in. And in the aftermath, what is now unfair in UK quality of life can eventually become fair with the UK leading the way!

Ronald E. Hall is Professor of Social Work at Michigan State University and an affiliated scholar of both African American & African Studies and the Julian Samora Research Institute at Michigan State University. Dr. Hall has published widely on the topic of racism and skin color, is a noted international lecturer and expert witness in court cases dealing with skin color issues. Dr. Hall is the author or coauthor of over 150 books, journal articles, interviews, and international presentations and lectures.

Loneliness Experiences of People with Facial Differences during the COVID-19 Pandemic

How does facial difference interact with experiences of loneliness? Already the subject of significant discussion, loneliness has become an even more pressing topic during the COVID-19 pandemic, as we navigate unprecedented periods of separation and isolation. Critically, people with disabilities have generally been ignored in the international debate about loneliness. Our normal social interactions have been altered, our usual support networks disrupted. Our homes have become our workplaces, gyms, schools, as well as pubs and restaurants. While no two experiences of lockdown are the same, many people have expressed pervasive feelings of loneliness as they have adjusted to each subsequent phase of restriction on social activities.

But loneliness is not always a negative experience, as highlighted in AboutFace PI Fay Bound Alberti’s recent Biography of Loneliness. Many have expressed comfort, relief, and contentment during periods of lockdown. Charities like Face Equality International and Changing Faces, which support people living with facial differences, have reported that some of their service users have found social distancing, and particularly mask wearing, to be comforting. Others have said that the removal of their usual social and institutional support networks has been incredibly difficult to cope with. Video calls pose their own challenges, as not all video conferencing platforms offer the option to ‘hide self view,’ meaning that people with facial differences are constantly seeing themselves in mirror image while on calls. These experiences vary from person to person, and are not solely governed by the severity of the facial difference nor the perceived ‘resilience’ of the individual. 

The variety of responses to the various stages of lockdown started us thinking about the particular experiences of people living with facial differences. Lived experience is essential to AboutFace. We recognise it as a form of expertise, one that is invaluable in our wider research. In particular, we want to acknowledge those whose experiences have previously been marginalised or their voices silenced in medical or historical settings. This is key to our research on face transplants, where there has to date been no attempt to understand the experience of the procedure from the point of view of the recipient. Our research on the emotional and cultural history of face transplants necessarily considers the wider experiences of the facial difference community. 

In order to guide our research, we draw from the extensive expertise of our Lived Experience Advisory Panel (LEAP), which is made up of individuals with facial difference who are specialists in areas such as research practice, evaluation, patient participation and involvement, disability rights and advocacy. This group has directly informed the questions that we ask in the survey, which has been developed in collaboration with Dr Kathleen Bogart, a psychologist at Oregon State University who specialises in ablelism and rare facial disorders, and sits as the chair of our LEAP. By hearing from people with visible differences we will focus on collecting memories, opinions, thoughts and feelings, outside of existing medical or psychological frameworks for assessing people’s experiences. Our aim is to listen, reflect and consider individual narratives.

Our survey seeks to explore the relationship between loneliness and facial difference during the various periods of lockdown during the COVID-19 pandemic. It is our hope that the results of the survey will enable us to better understand the experiences of people with visible facial differences, and what support might be beneficial to them as restrictions ease. The survey is open to everyone with a visible facial difference, over the age of 18, who is able to communicate in English. We are interested in hearing from anyone who meets these criteria, whether they are based in the UK or further afield. You can take part by following this link.

Dr Sarah Hall is the Public Engagement and Events Officer for the AboutFace project. She is a strong believer in the benefits of interdisciplinary research and in promoting genuine knowledge exchange between public audiences and academic researchers. Sarah is also a historian of seventeenth century puritanism; her research interests lie in correspondence, lived experience, community, and social networks.