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Skinny models in ads don't sell, and are likely a put-off to customers.

BRISBANE: Nov.20th - also reported in "Times of India":
Sick of seeing skinny models in magazine advertising wearing clothes you can’t even fit on your fingers?
Take heart ladies - a new study suggests using “plus-size” models, in place of ultra-thin and ultra-muscular images, can be just as effective in advertising.
The research, by University of Queensland PhD candidate Phillippa Diedrichs from the School of Psychology, used a series of mock advertisements for a range of beauty, clothing and accessory products.
More than 300 men and women aged 18-25 participated in the study, viewing the advertisements which featured size 8-10 or 14-16 female models (the latter considered ‘plus-size” models).
“Both men and women rated the advertisements featuring the average-size models as equally effective as the advertisements featuring the thinner models,” Ms Diedrichs said.
“Also, women who saw the size 14 models felt significantly better about their own bodies in comparison to those who saw the thinner models.”
Ms Diedrichs said she’d been interested in body image since high school, with a well-established relationship between exposure to unrealistic body types in the mass media and poor body image, disordered eating and exercising behaviours for both men and women.
“The average size Australian woman is a size 14-16,” she said.
“A lot of research has shown that people as young as three and as old as 70 are worried about body image.
“It is often argued that only thin models will sell.
“However, my research indicates that average-size models may be just as effective in advertisements and that many consumers actually want to see more realistic models,” she said.
In October this year, Australian Minister for Youth, Kate Ellis, proposed the development of a new voluntary media code of conduct for advertising, models and airbrushing.

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