NoCyberHate

Tuesday, June 07, 2005

Self-Hating White Girls on the Web

This may seem a bit of a stretch, but this struck me as relevant for thinking about 'hate online.' The New York Times today is reporting on some recently released research on 'pro-ana' websites. These are websites created and visited by adolescent girls who are anorexic and offer encouragement to others who are, or want to be.

Part of what is fascinating to me about this research is the methodology. Here's a description of the study from the article:

"For the study, the researchers sent surveys to the parents of 678 people, ages 10 to 22, who had been treated for eating disorders at Stanford. They also asked the parents to give separate surveys to their children.

In all, 64 patients and 92 parents responded.

And while the forms were anonymous, the researchers were able to link the responses of the patients with those of their families, to compare answers.

The study found that 39 percent of the patients had visited pro-eating-disorder Web sites, 38 percent pro-recovery sites and 27 percent both types of sites.

Despite the differences in reported hospital stays, the researchers found that those who spent time on the pro-eating-disorder sites provided basically the same information when asked about health changes as those who did not. Their weight was not much different from their ideal body weight, the researchers said, and they were no more likely to have changes in their menstrual cycles or to have symptoms of osteoporosis.

When the researchers tried to see how familiar parents were with the Web sites, they found that the parents whose children visited the sites were more likely to know about them and to be concerned about what their children were learning on the Web.

But 39 percent of those parents said they did not know whether their children visited pro-eating-disorder sites. And 15 percent wrongly reported that their children did not use them."


So, this is an interesting example of a 'user' study by way of a traditional survey.

And, there's another connection to my current project in this response to the pro-ana sites from one of the major portals:

"Some large Web servers like Yahoo, responding to complaints, have removed sites that promote eating disorders.

But the sites remain easy to find. And some experts wonder whether they are doing a better job of getting their message out than do the sites intended to promote recovery from eating problems."


Like the neo-Nazi sites, Web servers and ISP's are beginning to take responsibility for the content that's offered through their services. Yet, even those steps prove to be rather limited in effectiveness, again like the case of the neo-Nazi sites.


And, there's the connection to how the sites do -- or do not -- influence behavior.

Dr. Richard Kreipe, chief of adolescent medicine at the University of Rochester Medical Center, said he was struck by how attractive the pro-eating-disorder sites tended to be. Still, he said, it is hard to prove whether the sites actually make the problem worse.

The issue, Dr. Kreipe said, is probably not whether the sites can draw the average teenager into an eating disorder but whether they may influence someone with an inherited predisposition to develop the disease - especially an adolescent who is feeling isolated.

"The kid who's probably most vulnerable to this is the kid who's least connected to other people," he said.


Of course, what's missing in the New York Times article -- and likely in the study itself -- is any discussion race or gender. How many of these websites are created and visited by self-hating white girls?