Psychology for All

Yesterday I took my mind for a wander at the BPS "Psychology for All" conference in London and by golly what a cracking job they did at producing an engaging programme. Professor Richard Wiseman was a hoot with his 'psychology of luck' (University of Hertfordshire) and Nicky Rumsey's talk (from the Centre for Appearance Research, Bristol) on how psychologists are helping people who don't like their appearnce was very moving. I went along more for the style than the substance, given I've got my first public speaking outing in a while, in a fortnight. Professor Rumsey ran through some startling statistics about women's dissatisfaction with their bodies. She cited the work of Etcoff et al, 2006 who found that only 1:10 are free of concern re their weight/shape and that 25% of 15-64 year olds are actively considering cosmetic surgery. There were 32,000 private cosmetic treatments in the UK in 2007 and psychological screening of people undergoing such surgery is not mandatory. It's bonkers given that for a very large number of people, the desire for cosmetic surgery is rooted in a psychological issue and having the procedure doesn't solve it. Research by Sarwar in 2007 showed that people opting for cosmetic surgery tend to have lower self-esteem, lower confidence and unrealistic epectations of the outcome of surgery compared to people who haven't had or don't desire it. It's very difficult to compete with the marketing budget of the beauty industry and I'm not sure what the answer is. We could turn schools into wellbeing centres rather than academic institutions and teach programmes of self-esteem, how to be happy, what it is to be a good citizen, money management and a plethora of other valuable life skills that would make the world a better place for every individual and society as a whole. Hmmm.