The Beauty and the Beast Inside: The American Beauty—Does Cosmetic Surgery Help?

Abstract

American society's feminine ideal has consistently emphasized youth as beauty and getting old as ugly. Feeling unattractive produces several intrapsychic conflicts leading to depression and anxiety. Summary of the literature on beauty and aging, beauty and culture, and theories of physical beauty will be presented. With a clinical example of a female patient, the writer investigates the conscious and unconscious fantasies, conflicts, and sense of self inside and outside that impelled a physically beautiful female patient to bring her own body closer to her perception of idealized beauty with the aid of plastic surgery.

Assessment and determinants of aesthetic discomfort in hand osteoarthritis

“…If physical deformities, once they have occurred, are irreversible, treatment could be aimed at a patient's self-regard. Modern Western society perceives beauty as youthful perfection and ageing or disease as unsightly 26. Artist Henry Moore disputes this and is quoted as commenting on his drawing of Nobel Prize-winning scientist Dorothy Hodgkin's deformed hands: “an arthritic hand can be more moving than a perfect hand—the hand of a young girl, for example, though smooth and beautiful, can seem emptier of meaning.” Patients may benefit from exposure to a new way of viewing their deformities.…”

Why do selfies increase young women’s willingness to consider cosmetic surgery in China? The mediating roles of body surveillance and body shame

“…Cosmetic surgery has become popular among women who seek beauty by changing the physical appearance (Lijtmaer, 2010). Recently, cosmetic surgery has increased, and is relatively common in China (Hua, 2009(Hua, , 2013.…”

Psychodynamische Aspekte der ästhetischen Chirurgie des weiblichen Genitales – Ein Workshop-Bericht

“…Zur Psychodynamik der Schönheitschirurgie generell gibt es hingegen einige fall basierte Arbeiten, vgl. etwa Lemma (2010), Lijtmaer (2010)…”