Graduate Program
College Student Affairs
Degree Name
Master of Science (MS)
Semester of Degree Completion
2011
Thesis Director
James Wallace
Thesis Committee Member
Angela Yoder
Thesis Committee Member
Kelly Miller
Abstract
College students, especially women, experience several extreme changes during their undergraduate years. These changes occur in areas of physical development, mental capacity, personality expression, and interpersonal relationship development. With these women leaving home and trying to find their place and fit in at their new institution, they seek out various groups of people and organizations to join. One group or organization that many college women engage in is sorority membership. To date, minimal research has been conducted to investigate whether membership in a sorority has a negative or positive effect on their self images. The purpose of the present study was to investigate the self perceptions of body image between sorority members and non-sorority members at a small Midwestern university. Through quantitative survey, this study sought to explore the differences between current sorority members and nonsorority members and how they felt about their general body image and individual parts of the face and body. Findings from the present study were not statistically significant, however there were noteworthy findings. For example, while current membership in a sorority did not seem to have an effect on their self perceptions of body images in general, all women felt overwhelming negative about the shape of their abdomen. The survey questions were grouped into nine subcategories and both sorority and non-sorority members felt more positively about both their overall facial appearance as well as their individual facial features.
Recommended Citation
Piekarski, Amy L., "Perceptions of body image: A study of college women in sororities and not in sororities" (2011). Masters Theses. 143.
https://thekeep.eiu.edu/theses/143
