. welcome to "beyond the headlines." i'm cheryl jennings. today our show talks about body image. it's the way we perceive ourselves and how we look. our families, our friends, social pressure and the mass

media are just some of the contributing factors. it's important to note that our body image affects self-esteem and ultimately our mental health. last year several people from the organization about face took off most of their clothes in front of victoria's secret in san francisco. the group feels the chain portrays a body image that's unrealistic. protesters say not everybody can be a size 1 with great curves. >> not everybody needs to be like that in order to be attractive, in order to be awesome in general. and we really wanted to speak out just against that whole piece of it and all the people here really like the way that they look. >> well, about face wants people to feel good about their bodies, no matter what they look like. joining us in the studio right now is jennifer berger, she led the protest. she is the executive director of about face. jennifer, thank you for being here. we spoke several years ago and i'm really happy that you're still doing this work. >> thank you. i'm glad everyone has seen me without most of my clothes now

at this point as well. that's great. >> and you look great, by the way. so about face works with girls and young women to help analyze media messages. so tell me how you got your start with this. >> the way i got my start is when i was in college at the university of michigan i essentially watched an amazing video by jean killborn called "killing us softly" that really changed the way that i thought about all of this. i had lots of friends who had eating disorders and body image problems in high school and all the pieces just cameer for me really. so i started working with about face a couple of years later and i just never have stopped. >> that organization has the same mission that you had. it was on a nice little parallel track for you. >> yes, all-around media messages. so giving girls, especially girls the tools they need to really understand media mess annuals that affect their self-esteem and body image so that they can prevent that for themselves and lead healthier lives and be happier people. >> so what are some of the ways that you've seen in your experience that the media messages affect the way we look

at ourselves. >> well, there's so many different ways. the most obvious way is a girl or woman looks at an image, you know, these victoria secret images -- >> the magazines too. >> it's magazines, things on facebook that girls post of themselves even, and they just think i need to look like that in order for people to find me attractive and find me likeable. >> and so we were talking about how this affects your self-esteem and your mental health. so this can cause all kinds of problems too. >> oh, yeah. it can cause self-esteem problems for sure that run very deep, even down into issues like i'm not going to go for that job, i'm not going to go for that opportunity in my academic career because i don't feel good about the way that i look. and it can of course then affect the physical also with dieting being very dangerous, eating disorders, eating disorders are a physical illness as well as a mental illness. >> so now your organization has a very comprehensive approach to

this. describe some of the ways that you work with this. >> absolutely. so what we found is that the main reason that girls and women -- the main way they get their body image, they find out whether they are beautiful or not in our culture is through the media, is through culture. so what we do is we are really giving them tools to critique and learn about what they're seeing in media so that they can kind of prevent it from really absorbing into themselves and causing these types of problems. >> so is it online and is there a place they can go to take classes, for example? >> well, what we have is we do media literacy workshops and curriculum as well as parent education sessions at schools in the bay area. all over the bay area. and then we also have a website that has lots of information, lots of great information that can almost stand in for a workshop. it's at aboutface.org. >> and what are some of the ways that we as women and men can promote healthy body image. >> well, especially for

ourselves, we certainly can think about the things that our bodies can do and think about the other great characteristics that we have that are not related to attractiveness or really to appearance. and for girls, especially, but also for boys, you know, parents are girls and boys really need to talk about how great it is that your body can help you run, how great it is that your brain can help you think and all these different things as opposed to focusing on the outward appearance. >> i know you're a big advocate of yoga helping too? >> yes. yoga is an up and coming way of helping people with eating disorders and body image problems who aren't really finding that talk therapy is working great for them or in conjunction with talk therapy. so it really brings a person into her body and helps her feel her body from the inside out and really appreciate all the things that it can do and how it feels. >> all right, jennifer, thank you so much. keep up the great work.

>> absolutely. thank you so much. >> and we do have to take a little bit of a break right now but stay with us because in a moment we're going to hear from a local author who took a pledge to avoid looking in a mirror for a year. and in doing so, she gained self confidence and a new outlook on herself. stay with us, we'll be right back.

welcome back to "beyond the headlines," i'm cheryl jennings. we're talking about body image and the damaging effects possibly that mass media might have on self-esteem and self confidence. joining us in the studio is kirsten grives. she is a doctoral candidate in the department of sociology at ucla and the author of "mirror mirror off the wall, how i learned to love my body by not looking at it for a year." now, i can't imagine this because of the nature of the work that i do. so i'm looking at the headline and thinking i couldn't do that. so you spent a long time working on this book. >> i did. >> tell me what the motivation

was. >> well, as a sociology graduate student, my research focus is on body image and women's issues. so i surprised myself that when i was engaged to be married i kind of got caught up in all of that bridal hoopla about looking beautiful that one day and i felt so frustrated with myself about my own body image issues that i decided to needed something big to push back on that big media telling me i needed to look perfect. bout th uncomfortableness you had with your body image. >> well, when i was in high school and college, i had anorexia. i recovered from it, but part of recovery is staying really in tune with how you're feeling. and when you're triggered by something, you need to find a way to get back to a safer space. so for me when i was looking in the mirror trying on wedding dresses and thinking maybe i should lose five pounds, this would look so much better, i realized that losing five pounds was a bad idea and i thought go big or go home.

let's try a nuts project and i'll just give up mirrors and see if that would help me focus on things outside of my body. >> well, that's pretty drastic. how did you function? how did you do your hair? >> well, it took an adjustment of my lifestyle. i was very engaged in fashion. in fact i worked in fashion before i went back to school and so i really had to commit myself to shifting my attention away from that. so i did continue to wear clothes i love, i continued to wear makeup, just less, and very sheer products that i could smear on. >> without looking at yourself. >> exactly. and i also had to be open to allowing the people in my life to say, hey, you've got something in your teeth. >> okay, absolutely. so we talked about the effects that mass media has in some ways. it can be good, it can be bad. for you how was that? >> for me it was always a mixed bag. on the one hand as a sociologist i know that we are a species that loves to decorate ourselves. we use clothing and makeup and hair styling to communicate who

we are and the group that we want to be a part of. that said, the media today has really gone above and beyond what our primal ancestors wand find ways to manage it and put it in perspective. >> what is some of the advice that you have for women? >> for women and young women, i think that if you're going to subscribe to some of those beauty magazines, subscribe to "national geographic" too. >> now, you had to overcome anorexia and all of these other issues. >> mm-hmm. >> when you got done with your project, how did that change you? >> well, i feel like i'm being sappy, but the project was a huge step for me on a personal level. i gained a lot of confidence i hadn't had in the past just knowing that i had tested some of the doubts i had about how my life would change if i was less obsessed with appearance and after i challenged those thoughts, it turned out everything was fine. and so i have that memory to

look back on whenever i have doubts again. >> and then how about changing your perspective and improving your life in other ways as opposed to having it focus on you? >> i think that's actually the key to healthy body image. a lot of us think having a healthy body image is looking in the mirror and thinking i look like a ten of ten. my experience and research shows that a better body image is being able to say maybe i'm having a bad hair day, but that's just a tiny part of who i am and there's all these other things about me that i'm excited about. >> it's really tough when you go shopping. i've noticed that clothing changes sizes even though i haven't. all of a sudden i'm wearing smaller sizes and i know i'm not that small. >> it's really interesting. some of my research looked at the concept called vanity sizing. while men's sizing is typically by measurement, women's sizes are a little bit more arbitrary. and our clothing manufacturers know that we're sensitive about our bodies and they're playing into it. and some of us love the idea of

walking into a store and finding out that, oh, my goodness, i'm suddenly a size smaller. but at the end of the day i really think we owe it to ourselves to know our bodies and appreciate them and a label is just a label, it's not who we are. >> we have about 20 seconds left. what is your advice for people to go big? and go home? >> well, i think going big and going home means when you're at home, you need to be spending time with people who love you and i'll use a mirror pun here. they should reflect back to you the best things about yourself, and that's the secret. >> i love that, that is great advice. such a pleasure to meet you. >> you as well. thank you for having me. and we do have to take another break. when we come back, we're going to meet a bay area woman who created a community forum for asian-american women to talk about body image. about body image. stay with us, we'll be rhey, gr. you know how our family has... daddy and mommy... and me! yeah, that's right. pretty soon...

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welcome back to "beyond the headlines." we've been talking about body image and the way our physical appearance affects our open self confidence and the way others perceive it. studies in popular culture published in 2010, media images contribute to both positive and negative social stereotypes. racial differences in appearance and conversational style have significantly diminished. however, the representation of minorities on primetime has not changed over time. asian-americans are a growing minority group but are only found in 2% of the study sample. joining us right now in the

studio is lisa lee, the co-founder of thick dumpling skin. i love that name. it's a community forum for asian-americans to talk about experiences with body images. how did you come up with this name? >> my co-founder, lynn chen, is a very successful food blogger. one of the things that anybody who has founded any sort of ventures before will realize that coming up with a name and getting that address is the hardest part so she came up with a list of names that had to do with food and thick dumpling skin when it popped up, we just felt that it was the right thing. dumplings are something that's asian-american and it's also about what's on the inside that counts. so when i read it, i was like we have to go with this one, it works. >> i'm thinking body texture, you know. but okay, i love it. that's perfect. so tell me about the motive for

doing all this, because obviously there was a need inside you and your friend. >> the interesting thing is that it started with me writing an article in a magazine, an asian-american publication that i was a part of. in sharing my own story, you know, having gone through this personal journey of perfection and what that is, i shared the story, but did not realize at all that it would resonate with so many people. and lynn, you know, was one of those people and she reached out and she told me that she herself had eating disorders for many years. >> had you known her ahead of this? >> actually i was a very big fan of hers. i was a fan of her work. so when she reached out to me, i was kind of shocked for a couple of days. i was like is this the lynn chen? and then we started talking and really just bonded over what it's like to be asian-american and having that pressure of, you know, having that perfect body,

whatever that is. >> well, can you describe some of those struggles? >> yeah, definitely. i think for the website, for us the story that we really want to tell is that of course i think all women and a lot of men struggle with body image, regardless of race, ethnicity, but i think it's very interesting to look at it from the lens of the cultural standpoint as well because i think for many asian-americans, particularly the ones that have immigrant families, et cetera, this idea of being too big is something that is such a huge pressure. >> it's like the stereotype? >> it is a stereotype. >> what is the stair oe >> it is a stereotype. >> what is the stair reostereot? >> i think the stereotype that is out there in the mass media and is actually very internalized amongst our own cultures is that asian-american women are just born naturally skinny. that we apparently have a skinny

gene. we are petite and this is how we are supposed to look. and it's very damaging for people who don't fit, you know, within that mold because they start to really question themselves about whether or not they are really a part of this community and whether or not they are, quote unquote, asian enough. so, you know, and i think self confidence, self-esteem, everything just kind of rolls from that. >> well, you're a big resource, so how -- what's your advice for women and for men? >> well, i think as we see more and more of these stories, lynn and i always come back to this idea of how do we get people to think about, first of all, mental health, because i think image issues and eating disorders is really a manifestation of your mental state. so how do we of promote wellness and, you know, it's not about just accepting yourself unconditionally because there

are many flaws about ourselves that we would love to change, right? so how do we do that in a constructive and positive way. so i think that's number one. and number two, i think just educating people and raising awareness around how stereotypes play into the way that we see ourselves. hopefully we can give people the tools to really understand and digest and consume all of that. >> and you have a great website too. thank you so much for being here and thank you for the work you're doing. >> thank you. >> it's really important. all right, we do have to take another break, but when we come back, we're going to learn about the dangers of eating disorders and how you can change the way you think about food and about yourself. stay with us, we'll be right back.

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international journal of eating disorders, only one in ten men and women with eating disorders actually received treatment. here in the studio with us right now is rebecca cooper. she has written a book called "diets don't work." she's also founded rebecca's house, eating disorders and treatment program. and i have to say i agree, diets don't work. >> absolutely. absolutely. >> so tell me how you came up with the idea for the book. i think that you probably had an eating disorder yourself? >> yes. after years of recovery, i actually started working with people who had problems with -- at first it was more like yo-yo dieting and i realized that the devastation that's caused by the failed diets wias having a big impact on people's self-esteem, along with setting them up to get into disordered eating. i found out too that dieting actually changes the brain chemistry and some people progress into eating disorders. >> when did you recognize this in yourself?

>> in myself, not until i had years of recovery, years of recovery did i start -- in fact a lot of this information is new. we didn't even know about how the brain was involved in the eating disorder. >> so tell me a little bit more about that. so we're talking diet, nutrition and exercise affecting the brain and your body. >> yes. if you think about especially body image, i mean that's the way we look at ourself. and if we think that we have to be something other than what we are, we start doing things like extreme exercisedieting, dietid some people will progress until they're dieting and they just give up because they keep failing. >> exactly. >> or they go the other way and they keep dieting to the point of thinking they're going to be happy at a certain weight and they're not. because you still feel the same way inside if you haven't dealt with the reasons why you have the eating disorder in the first place. >> so you founded rebecca's house. tell me about that. >> yes. rebecca's house is a clinic.avee

we have three houses for eating disorders and co-occurring disorders. we have people from all over the world who come to us. we have different levels of care. so our objective is to get people at first it needs to be pretty structured, but before they leave, we want them to have like a temporary job or a volunteer position or take a class at a local university. our goal is to help them to internalize the controls around the eating, instead of us forcing or somebody else forcing or making them do something externally. >> well, what are some of those little -- give me a little free therapy here. what are some of the steps to recovery? >> well, first of all is to recognize that there is a problem. and that's the hardest. that's the hardest, recognize and then, you know, get help. but getting back in touch with your real authentic true self and appetite. that's how you know if you're hungry or if you're full.

>> and you shouldn't just eat when you're not hungry? >> no. >> exactly. >> a lot of people do. a lot of people do, but some people progress to the point to where it takes over their life. so some of the things that people learn to do is, first of all, what are the triggers. i need to get through those. it could be trauma, something like that. and also to start eating healthy so that the brain can start healing itself and the body so you can start thinking correctly again. so healthy eating is definitely a part, healthy exercise, not extreme exercise. >> it's better to do this, though, with a doctor's guidance, right? >> you know, cheryl, it takes a team. you really need a team. that's one of the reasons we are having some good success at rebecca's house because we have on staff, you know, registered dietitians, therapists, medical doctors, psychiatrists, and we do all kinds of different

therapies in groups and emdr, which is for trauma. >> what are some of the triggers for people? >> you know, some people actually have a food addiction and don't realize it. yes. and this is, again, this is new research that's coming out, that there are some foods that actually affect the rewards system in the brain much like alcohol and drugs. and the people who are predisposedenetically genetical, they can be triggered by something in their environment or trauma or just dieting to where they go into this cycle of like they have to have it. they have one cookie and -- >> they have to eat the whole bag? >> yes. >> we have about 20 seconds left. so how can parents help their children get through this? >> first of all, model healthy eating yourself. and also talk about yourself in a way that's positive. you know, when you see other people, don't make remarks about

them being overweight or they should lose weight. don't ask your child to be perfect in everything. and if they say that i'm fat, go beyond that. ask them has something happened or what's -- what are you feeling, what else is going on. >> all right, rebecca. we have so much good advice from for being here,'ll find it thank you for being here, really appreciate it. >> thank you, cheryl. >> and that is all the time we have for today. my thanks to all of our guests. for more information about today's program, go to our today's program, go to our website, abc7neing ever. [ angelic music plays ] ♪ toaster strudel! best morning ever! [ hans ] warm, flaky, gooey. toaster strudel! [ female announcer ] try new pillsbury heat-n-go mini pancakes. ♪ [ male announcer ] don't wait for awesome... totino's pizza rolls gets you there in just 60 seconds.

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