BBC World Service Online

The Why Factor

Documentaries

Factual

The extraordinary and hidden histories behind everyday objects and actions

The Why Factor: Thin

Why Thin

27/05/2016 GMT

Thin

BBC World Service - The Why Factor, Thin

Mike Williams asks why so many people want to be thin in a world grappling with obesity.

Mike Williams asks why so many people want to be thin in a world grappling with obesity. Are we hard-wired to like a certain body shape or is “thin” just a passing fashion?

For thousands of years, a thin body was a sign of poverty or disease. But there is now a growing, global obsession with being thin.  And this at a time when many populations around the world are, paradoxically, suffering epidemics of obesity. Mike Williams finds out why, as he speaks to former French model Victoire Macon Dauxerre, Tony Glenville from the London College of Fashion, Anne Becker from Harvard Medical School, Professor John Speakman from University of Aberdeen and Etta Edim from Nigeria’s Efik tribe.


Image: A vendor arranges stick-thin mannequins in a store in China (Credit: China Photos/Getty Images)

BBC World Service

BBC World Service schedule for American satellite radio and the Caribbean

BBC World Service Americas and the Caribbean

BBC World Service Australasia

BBC World Service East Asia

BBC World Service Europe and the Middle East

BBC World Service South Asia

BBC World Service West and Central Africa Schedule

BBC World Service West and Central Africa

BBC World Service East and Southern Africa Schedule

Accessibility links

Programme Index

The Why Factor

Thin

Genres

Formats

Brand

BBC World Service Online

About BBC World Service