?This Is How Women Today REALLY Feel About Getting Naked
Throughout history, artists have seen the nude figure as a beautiful expression of womanhood, in all its glorious shapes and sizes. But ask the average female how she views her own bod in the buff and it gets a lot more complicated. Nakedness reveals everything we usually get to hide: vulnerabilities that date back to high school, parts you struggle to love (or just outright hate), scars, stretch marks, etc., etc., etc. Women’s Health conducted a reader survey in 2013 to chart that complex relationship we have with our stripped-down selves. Now, though it’s just four years later, a lifetime of change has occurred on the body front. The body-positivity movement exploded, strong replaced skinny as social media’s favorite adjective, and #loveyourcurves campaigns abound—making us wonder, is there more love? More peace? How do women really feel about their bodies in 2017?
RELATED: Sofia Vergara Shares What It Was Like To Pose Naked At Age 45
To find out, we polled over 2,700 women in the U.S., plus thousands more around the globe.* Some of the results are inspiring; others, confounding. Check out this snapshot of the results:
Read on to discover what’s changed—and what, rather defiantly, has not.
*Women’s Health’s international editions conducted the survey in their respective countries: Australia, Brazil, Germany, Greece, the Netherlands, Poland, Russia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Turkey, and the United Kingdom, plus a combined eight countries in Latin America.