Girls as young as 8 obsessed with beauty: Oz study

MELBOURNE - A study has found that Australian girls as young as eight are starting to become obsessed with beauty, a fact which is worrying women that children are becoming image conscious far too early.

A survey, carried out on almost 2000 Australian women aged from their teens to their late 60s, had found that women became aware of society’s obsession with beauty at the age of 14.

But now after a nationwide survey conducted by McCrindle Research, it is believed that the average age of a girl’s grasp of beauty is just eight years old.

Mark McCrindle, of McCrindle Research, said that while beauty regimes once began in the teenage years, younger girls were now becoming concerned about beauty.

“Australia’s young people are more fashion aware, techno-logically connected and empowered than previous generations,” the Courier Mail quoted him as saying.

“Therefore young women are adopting beauty regimes earlier and being influenced by fashion at an earlier age - not just in the teen years but increasingly the ‘tween’ years,” he stated.

Richard Wolstenholme, the vice-president of marketing for cosmetics company Nutrimetics, which commissioned the research, said women overwhelmingly felt that children were being exposed too young.

“Australian women agreed that they first started to become aware of society’s interest in beauty around the age of 14,” he said.

“Nowadays women believe that girls are thinking about beauty much too young, estimating the average age of a girl’s grasp of beauty at just eight years old,” he added. (ANI)