Colorism and Usage of Makeup and its Effect on Self-esteem and Fear of Negative Appearance in Females

Description

Page: 230-235

Rachana R. Pai and Deepakkumar S. (Department of Psychology, CHRIST (Deemed To be University), Central Campus, Bengaluru, Karnataka)

Women in South Asia are prone to be discriminated against based on their skin, with higher use of cosmetics and a high prevalence of psychological distress. This study aims to study the effect of colorism and usage of makeup on self-esteem and fear of negative appearance evaluation in young females. With a snowball sampling, young female participants (N = 212; mean age = 20.5 years; SD = 1.97) from Bengaluru, India, completed self-report measures of makeup usage, skin tone, Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale, and Fear of Negative Appearance evaluation scale. With the Kruskal-Wallis H test, it was found that skin tone affected on self-esteem and had little to no effect on fear of negative appearance evaluation. It was also found that makeup has no effect on self-esteem, whereas individuals with a high fear of negative appearance evaluation had more significant makeup usage.