BY THE age of six, most girls are now dissatisfied with their bodies and want to be thinner, researchers have claimed; almost half believe they need to go on a diet to lose weight.

Research published today suggests that, within a year of starting school, most girls are being subjected to peer group pressure to lose weight. The authors, Hayley Dohnt and Marika Tiggemann from Flinders University, South Australia, said the girls' belief that "thin is beautiful" can stem from watching pop stars on television or comments made while trying on clothes. By the time they reached their second year of schooling, 71.5 per cent of the girls said they desired a slimmer body shape. In addition, 45.7 per cent said they would use dietary restraint if they gained weight.

"Previously, research has focused on adolescence as the likely time for the emergence of body dissatisfaction," said Ms Dohnt. "But clear evidence has accumulated that a substantial number of pre- adolescent girls are dissatisfied with their bodies and wish to be thinner."

The study showed that, of 81 five to eight-year-old girls at private schools in Adelaide, only 11 were, in fact, overweight and three obese. The researchers also found the girls had little concept of body dissatisfaction when they arrived in the reception class at the age of five.

"The major life event which occurs over the five-to-seven year age range, when body dissatisfaction begins, is the commencement of schooling," Ms Dohnt said. "Therefore, peer influence, which has been investigated extensively for adolescents but has been assumed as more or less irrelevant for young children, may be particularly salient for this age group."


The report, published in the British Journal of Developmental Psychology, concludes: "It seems that girls develop a desire to be thinner during the early years of schooling, somewhere around six to seven years of age. They also display an awareness of the definition and concept of what constitutes dieting."

The report's authors said most of the six and seven-year-olds rated their ideal figure as significantly thinner than they in fact were. They were able to suggest restrictive eating practices - for example, not eating fatty foods - as a means of achieving their ideal shape.

The girls were also shown the silhouettes of nine young female figures - and asked to point out which were most like them and which they would most like to look like. Most girls chose a thinner silhouette as their ideal shape.

They were also shown two pictures of a girl called Anne who had put on weight since starting school. "Girls seemed particularly aware of teasing and likeability on the basis of weight and shape," the report concluded. In all, 39 per cent of girls in the reception year thought Anne would face teasing as a result of her weight increase - while 72 per cent of year one girls (six-year-olds) believed she would.

The findings showed that most of the girls believed that being thin would "increase likeability". This has important implications for the development of early intervention programmes to teach youngsters about a healthy lifestyle, the authors suggest.

Sarah Schenkar, a dietician with the British Nutrition Foundation, said: "I think it stems from this obsession with celebrities and what they look like - which is obviously reaching youngsters at an early age.

"Normally, though, teachers would shy away from discussions about `Am I too fat or am I too thin?' for fear of stirring up a hornet's nest. It is something that - consistently - teachers try not to bring up because they don't want to put that kind of idea into their pupils."