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That inferior feeling

May 13, 2004

The ideal man? It's enough to give you an eating disorder.

Muscular men abound in ads and movies but real men cringe under the pressure, writes Renee Mickelburgh.





Dr Stacey Tantleff-Dunn, a professor of psychology at the University of Central Florida who carried out the research, said that men were being bombarded with extremely muscular images in the media, both in advertisements and in feature films.

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"When you look at some of the [older] male images, say James Dean or Humphrey Bogart, they were reasonably sized," she said. "Nowadays, with films such as Rambo and the Arnold Schwarzenegger movies, the men are way larger and that's why we see men suffering from body image disturbance and anxiety, which we know are related to overall self-esteem and mood.

"It also explains why some males are becoming drawn to the idea of steroids. Steroids take your body to a place it wouldn't naturally go. It could lead to over-exercising."

Many sportsmen are being used to promote products. David Beckham, the Real Madrid and England footballer, is the face of numerous campaigns including Vodafone and Police sunglasses, while Arsenal's Freddie Ljungberg showed off an impressive six-pack when he stripped down for Calvin Klein.

"Anything that increases the discrepancy between how we see ourselves and how we would like to be, often leads to some sort of dissatisfaction or anxiety," Dr Tantleff-Dunn says. She believes that there is growing pressure on men to look good, as women take on more "male" roles.

"It used to be that women were much more focused on men providing financial security - looks and body shape were secondary to them having a nice personality. But now it looks like women may be wanting the whole package. Even if they don't, that's what males perceive."

Psychologists have termed the problem the "Adonis complex", with even many regular sports players or gym-goers worrying that they are not muscular or toned enough. Some researchers say that the growing numbers of magazines such as FHM, which regularly feature male models with rippling muscles, have contributed to the phenomenon.

A recent study of 140 British men also had similar findings. When shown images of muscular males advertising Calvin Klein and Armani underwear, more than 50 per cent of them said that they felt intimidated by the images.

Rosalind Gill, a social psychologist at the London School of Economics, said: "They were pressured and felt it was unfair that however much they worked out ... they would never be able to achieve the sort of body you see in those adverts."

Karl Tierney, last year's British body building champion and the owner of Crosby Health Leisure in Liverpool, said that he had noticed an increase in men coming to his gym and wanting a more muscular physique. "Everyone looks at advertisements and pictures of other people and wants to be like them, especially young lads who are interested in body building or interested in looking a little bit better," he said.

"Male vanity is getting worse. Men go to nail shops now and get their nails done and they get their hair dyed. I think there is a lot of pressure on them now. You see all the images on television, the pictures of the Beckhams, and people try to emulate them."

Tierney, 34, said that boys as young as 17 came to his gym wanting to improve their physique. "Most of them only do upper-body stuff. Most of them want a big chest or big arms."

He said that some men who were dissatisfied with their bodies turned to steroids.

"People want to get what they want quicker: they think that by taking a magic pill something is going to happen, but that's not necessarily the case."

In Australia, many fewer boys present with eating disorders than girls, says Dr Simon Clarke, the director of the adolescent medical unit at the Children's Hospital at Westmead. But the British Eating Disorders Association said that it had seen a sharp rise in the number of men contacting them with problems. Steve Bloomfield, its spokesman, said that while men who developed an eating disorder may restrict their diet slightly, most over-exercised and over-metabolised their food - effectively starving themselves.

"That is probably the most common route for males to develop an eating disorder," he said.

The Telegraph, London