Shahista Kassam recently wrote on “The Effect of Barbie Doll Commercials on Young Girls”.  While I agree with the points made in her discussion of such a topic such as how “Barbie doll commercials create a negative image in the minds of young girls” (Kassam), I to some extent disagree with the amount of negative attention brought to ads such as the Barbie Doll ad.

On the streets, in high schools, in university marketing courses, you hear all about how mass media distorts teenage girls’ definition of “beauty”.  My question however, is how many of us pay attention to all the positive change that has come about this topic over the last few years?

Negativity Bias is defined as the “Human’s capacity to put more weight on negative entities than positive”.  If I asked all the readers of this blog to raise their hand if they agree to this statement, I believe 60% of readers will have raised their hand.

Students, teachers, preachers, parents, and professors worldwide have posed the issue of how mass media has distorted teenage girls’ definition of “beauty”.  What they overlook, is how society as a whole is coming together piece by piece to address this issue.  For example, in 2012 a 14 year old girl, Julia Bluhm, decided to stand up for what she believes strongly in.  She approached Seventeen magazine in an attempt to get them to stop the use of Photoshop the portray authentic beauty on “one photo spread per month”.  Although the protest did not go through, steps were paved for future success. To speak numbers, 40,000 people signed Julia’s petition.  Julia, along with hundreds of others said: “I didn’t think it was going to get this big” (Julia Bluhm).

Now, I pose the same question.  If I now asked all the readers of this blog to raise their hand if they believe now, that they are proven guilty to this negativity bias, I believe 95% of readers will have raised their hand.