Sarah Coyne, Family Life
We are happy to report on our study “Pregnancy, media, and body image” which received a MEG grant two years ago.
Evaluation of how well the academic objectives of the proposal were met
In the past two years we have made great progress on three different aspects of the study.
- Qualitative interviews: We collected data from 50 postpartum and pregnant women involving how the media influences their body image. We have now coded all interviews and used this data to design the experimental portion of the study.
- Experimental study: We are in the middle of data collection for this study. In short, women come into the lab and read one of two magazines – one showing photoshopped pictures of pregnant celebrities or a control magazine. Next, their body image is measured. As of writing this report, we have collected data from 162 women. During next semester, we hope to get this number up to 200 women.
- Longitudinal study: We have worked with the CREATE project on campus, which is a longitudinal study of new marriages. We have pilot tested a number of questions and will begin data collection this next semester.
IN SUM – we are well on our way to meeting the academic objectives of the proposal.
Evaluation of the mentoring environment/ student involvement
I worked with a small group of students over the course of two semesters to run the project (see a list of student names below). Many took a research class to fulfill their capstone credit for SFL – a few did the research for pay. All presented a research paper at the Fulton Mentored Learning Conference at BYU. A few of the exceptional students, then presented these posters at an international conference in July. The topics were not specific to this study (we did not have full data at that point). However, they completed these in conjunction with the class they took to collect the pregnancy data. All will be graduating with BSc degrees either this April or next year. Multiple students have applied for graduate school, specifically because of their involvement with this project (Hailey Gardner, Madi Memmott, Emilie Davis).
Pregnancy, Media, and Body Image students (2014)
- Kelli Canady
- Michon Marchant
- Hayley Abrahamson
- Cameron Davis
- Elisabeth Hatfield
- Katherine Welch
- Ian Seitz
- Emalee Wade
- Hailey Gardner
- Madison Memmott
- Emilie Davis
- Haley White
- Lee Essig
- Kim Reynolds
- Sarah Grotenhuis
- Chantel Iannone
- Juli Webb
- Rachel Moore
- Aubrey Sharp
- Brandon Clifford
- Kevin Collier
Student presentations at ISRA (all students worked on the pregnancy project and completed a poster as part of the class)
- Clifford, B. N., & Coyne, S. M. (2014). Keep calm, we have a Hulk: Connections between subtypes of self regulation and aggressive behavior. Poster presented at the biennial meeting of the International Society for Research on Aggression, Atlanta, Georgia.
- Collier, K. M., Coyne, S. M., & Busby, D. (2014). Aggressive television: How fathers’ choices in media influence their child’s aggression. Poster presented at the biennial meeting of the International Society for Research on Aggression, Atlanta, Georgia.
- Dalton, A. D., Coyne, S. M., & Padilla-Walker, L. M. (2014). From TV to Juvie, why less media is better: The external outcomes of restricting media time. Poster presented at the biennial meeting of the International Society for Research on Aggression, Atlanta, Georgia.
- Gardner, H., Coyne, S. M., & Padilla-Walker, L M. (2014). Halo, not so angelic? The effect of violent video games on empathy and perspective taking. Poster presented at the biennial meeting of the International Society for Research on Aggression, Atlanta, Georgia.
- Memmott, M. K., & Coyne, S. M. (2014). Violence that transcends the virtual: Violent video games and their effects on value systems. Poster presented at the biennial meeting of the International Society for Research on Aggression, Atlanta, Georgia.
Results of the project.
We are still in data collection so do not have final results yet. However, we have coded the qualitative interviews and provide a few quotes for consideration.
- “The media is the reason why so many women get into anorexia and bulimia and all that! This is what they see, they see perfect women, but come on, they’re all are photo shopped. I mean, HEAVILY photoshopped. They ARE pretty, I’m not saying they are not. But I think they’re just as pretty without makeup.”
- “There’s a lot of emphasis on how good celebrities can look after having the baby. So I think it puts a lot of stress on us normal people who maybe we just don’t… I mean everybody is different and maybe we don’t have the resources they have, like to hire a personal trainer or to have someone to come in and cook organic whole foods for you, and not to mention somebody that maybe to watch your baby while you exercise. There’s just so much pressure on getting the body back.”
- “The media seems to say “Get it over [pregnancy, birth, and recovery] as fast as you can and then get on with focusing on yourself.”
- “I think the biggest one that I’ve noticed is that, the most important thing is that you quickly get your body back to normal. But you don’t see a lot of like, and look at my baby, like he is learning to, he can roll over now or look he is so responsive because I’ve been spending lots of time talking to him. I feel like the number one thing is, you be big and pregnant and the next week you look very small, and that’s all the media really covers.”
Budget spent
| Interviews | |
| Gift cards | 1200 |
| Onesies | 411 |
| Other (water, toys, extra onesies) | 200 |
| Experimental study | |
| Gift cards | 8600 |
| Onesies | 1600 |
| other (magazine, copies, water) | 300 |
| Paid RAs | 3300 |
| Supplement to student travel to conference | 5000 |
| TOTAL | 20,611 |