Question

Leticia is at Bellevue High School. She thinks she is fat and begins to starve herself

(engage in anorexic behaviors). Provide 2 individualistic explanations for Leticia's
behavior. Then, using your sociological imagination, provide 2 sociological/institutional
explanations for Leticia's behavior.

Answer 1

She may have developed the eating disorder as a coping mechanism for something going on in her life such as pressure from school/grades, bullying, depression, etc.

Or it may just be society's lack of a healthy and reasonable view of weight, body image, and beauty standards that pushed her to eventually become anorexic.

Answer 2

Leticia is dissatisfied with her image and has a low self-esteem. This behavior occurs because she feels pressured to fit into a standard of beauty imposed by society, in addition to not finding beauty references similar to her.

Step-by-step explanation:

Society imposes standards of beauty that are often unattainable for ordinary people. In addition, it is standard, so that only people who have these characteristics are considered beautiful, attractive and desired. Other people who do not have these characteristics are not considered references, on the contrary, society judges them as ugly, sloppy and often use pejorative terms, which cause very bad results in these people and those who look like them.

An example of this is the case of Leticia, who for not fitting the standard of beauty imposed by society is ugly, in addition, does not find references similar to her, who are praised and encouraged to be who they are. This lowers Leticia's self-esteem and makes her want to modify herself with dangerous and destructive methods.