A new Dove survey finds that more than half of girls, ages 10 to 17, have low self-esteem and it’s keeping them from truly enjoying life
Overall, 55% of girls say that being unhappy with the way they look keeps them from spending time with friends and family, or participating in activities outside their house like a team or a club. And for girls with low body esteem, that number goes up to 80%.
And the media certainly isn’t helping things. While 78% of girls do say they feel they are beautiful even though they don’t look like women they see in the media, only 12% of girls with low body esteem feel the same way.
But not all results of the study were negative. In fact, 82% of the girls polled say they have something about themselves that they think is beautiful. What’s more, 70% of girls believe there’s too much focus on beauty being the main source of happiness, and 68% of girls want to see the media focus on more diverse types of physical attractiveness.