But the Cornell study also seems to indicate that underweight women are much more influenced by media imagery than overweight women are. There's some evidence that heavier women are more likely to take their cues from the people they see around them instead. That theory was bolstered recently when a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine found that having overweight friends makes people much more likely to carry extra pounds themselves. "If more of their friends are overweight, maybe that changes their perception of what it means to be overweight," Neighbors says. They may simply see being fat as the new normal.

That may not be quite as bad as it sounds, if it makes women feel better about their bodies. A recent University of Minnesota study published in the Journal of Adolescent Health examined the relationship between body satisfaction and BMI five years later among a group of overweight teen girls. Researchers Patricia van den Berg and Dianne Neumark-Sztainer found that overweight girls who were more comfortable with their bodies were less likely to gain weight as they entered young adulthood. The Minnesota research suggests that girls who felt good about themselves were more likely to be physically active and pay more attention to what they ate. They didn't lose much weight, but they made healthy lifestyle changes that at least prevented them from gaining more weight. Meanwhile, the researchers found that the girls who were the most dissatisfied with their size tended to become more sedentary over time and paid less attention to maintaining a healthy diet. Those who were unhappy with their bodies were, in fact, more likely to gain more weight. If the same holds true on a larger scale, then encouraging women to love and care for their bodies—even when they don't match the Hollywood ideal—may be one way to reverse or at least slow the progression of the obesity epidemic.

Maybe our New Year's resolution should be to love ourselves enough to be the healthiest we can be, instead of constantly beating ourselves up that we're not a real size 2. That's something to think about as we squeeze into our dress jeans and head for the holiday buffet.

© 2007