Tweens and Body Image

Posted by Lori Henry Dec 22, 2006

Store like La Senza Girl are catered to the Tween age, those between the ages of 6-12 years old, a title which has been created only within the last 15 years. These young girls can now buy padded bras for their non-existent breasts, play dolls who look trampy, and look up to role models who have celebrity status for starring in a hit film or two.

The marketing manager of Mattel, the company who produces Barbie dolls, Julie Keanrs, commented: "Someone identified this gap in the marketplace between the girl who is still a child under the age of about nine, and a real teenager of 13 or 14 who has reached puberty. They identified this girl getting older younger, [and thought] 'here's a market we could cater for in the right way and increase our sales'."

Dr. Michael Carr-Gregg, a psychologist and author of Bitchface Syndrom: Surviving Adolescent Girls, believes that the loss of childhood is taking a step backwards, instead of forwards: “It's all about sexualisation and the objectification of women… about being attractive to boys- and I hope there are generations of collective feminists rolling in their collective graves looking at his stuff because it's so retrograde.

“There is absolutely nothing positive about it, and I think it's sending all the wrong messages to an already confused and bemused bunch of kids- and what worries me is that it's the parents who are very often talked into buying these things".