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Men's Looks
Men's Dissatisfaction with Their Looks
According to Pope, Phillips & Olivardia (2000)
women are often believed to be much more frequently dissatisfied with their looks than men are. But in reality, according
to recent research, the perception is wrong: Many men are just as unhappy, or almost as unhappy, with their appearance as
women. Furthermore, men aren't just preoccupied or dissatisfied with their body image; they may also have a distorted body
image, perceiving themselves as looking different (and generally worse) than they really do. There's often a vicious circle
here: The more a person focuses on his body appearance, the worse he tends to feel about how he looks--obsession breeds
discontent. And whether men experience outright distortions of body image or are simply dissatisfied with their bodies, they
tend to have lower self-esteem and more depression that body-satisfied men. In fact, some recent studies have indicated
that the connection between a bad body image and low self-esteem is even stronger among men than among women. The shame
factor of these men is enormous. Most men would be mortified to reveal how much they care about, dislike, and try to improve
their looks. Instead they suffer in silence.
What Men Invested On Their Looks Last year
Pope, Phillips & Olivardia (2000) report that American men in the last year spent:
- Over
$2 billion on commercial gym memberships
- Another $2 billion on home exercise
equipment
- The paid circulation of Men's Health was more than 1.5 million
in 1997
- Several billion dollars are spent annually on men's cosmetic procedures.
In 1996 men received 690,361 cosmetic procedures including:
- 217,083 hair
transplantations or restorations
- 65,861 chemical peels,
- 54,106 liposuctions
- 28,289 treatments
to remove varicose veins
- $3.5
billion on men's toiletries (hair color, moisturizers tooth whiteners, etc.)
- Billions
spent on nutritional supplements that claim to build muscle or burn fat
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