REVIEW OF LITERATURE
Dance has been around for thousands upon thousands of years. There are so many different variations and genres of dance, that the art is becoming extremely popular. Several scientific research studies have been done on the correlation between eating disorders and dancers.
The BBC released an article titled, "Ballet and eating disorders: 'Unspoken Competitiveness' adds pressure to be thin." This article is about Victoria Ferguson's experience and desire to be thin. This is widespread among dancers who feel a certain pressure to look a specific way. Ferguson put a strain on herself that eventually developed into an eating disorder. She states how there is an unspoken competitiveness between dancers and this makes eating disorders more prevalent amongst dancers, similar to the modeling industry. |
The prevalence of eating disorders is 10 times higher than in non-dancers. Victoria falls right into this category and is apart of the 1.6 million others in the UK who are affected by eating disorders. Victoria was a dancer her entire life. She developed bulimia at age 15 and her obsession with her weight only got worse once she joined a professional dance school. Several studies and experiments have been conducted on the correlation between eating disorders and dancers. There is a strong positive correlation between the two. Eating Disorders Hope published an article stating, "ballet dancers have a significantly higher risk of developing eating disorders than their non-dancing peers." Perfectionism plays a key role in the relationship between ballet and eating disorders. Dancers are there on worst enemies, but the teachers play a large role too. There are several teachers who fire dancers who are not skinny enough. This provokes eating disorders among dancers. Switching gears, the art of dance has really changed throughout the years. Today, the public thinks of competition dancers and instantly thinks of Lifetime's "Dance Moms." Speaking from experience, competition dance is nothing like the show. I think it is a disgrace that how the public views dancers and their moms is based off of the show.
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