Wednesday, September 3, 2014

British Study Finds That Chicks Who Wear Hijabs Have a More Positive Body Image

Some really smart psychologists studied the matter, so it must be true:
Though to Western women, Muslim women in the Mid-East and Asia seem oppressed because they have no choice in wearing a hijab, the Islamic head- and body-cover common in Muslim culture, studies have shown that Muslim women have a more positive body image.

Psychologists using a wider range of body image measures have found that British Muslim women who wear a hijab generally have more positive body image, are less reliant on media messages about beauty ideals, and place less importance on appearance than those who do not wear a hijab. These effects appear to be driven by use of a hijab specifically, rather than religiosity.  
A total of 587 British Muslim women completed a battery of scales assessing their frequency and conservativeness of hijab use, body image variables, attitudes towards the media and beauty ideals, importance of appearance, and religiosity. Preliminary results indicated that 218 women never used the hijab and 369 women used some form of the hijab at least rarely.

Controlling for religiosity, women who wore the hijab had more positive body image, lower internalization of media messages about beauty standards, and placed less importance on appearance than women who did not wear the hijab...
What's the point here--that more chicks should wear hijabs? I bet women who wear burqas have an even lower "internalization of media messages about beauty standards" and place "less importance on appearance" that chicks who wear hijabs. Does that mean all women should be wearing burqas?

This is a stupid study that's aimed at sanitizing the second class status Islam accords women. It has nothing of significance to tell us beyond that.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Maybe they place less importance on appearance because they have bigger fish to fry, i.e. trying not to commit any of the multitude of infractions that could have them legally beaten or murdered, not having their husbands/fathers/brothers assault them, and navigating their way through the outdoors while trying to see through a minuscule opening in a piece of fabric. Did the 'psychologists' driving this study consider any of this?

It's all relative.

scaramouche said...

That may have factored that into what they called "religiosity." Then again, political correctness being rampant in the U.K., the topic of "honour" killings was probably not even considered.