She is beauty, she is grace, she’s wearing a pink dress. She can do anything. This is Barbie, the girl living not just the American, but every dream. She is the person most children look up to. With her impressive resume of more than 200 careers, Malibu dreamhouse and over 9 million subscribers on her YouTube channel, Barbie is one of the biggest role models for children. Is she a good one though? Even with her success in everything she does, her surreal, nearly emaciated body sends a very different message to the world. There have been countless debates about Barbie brainwashing children into thinking that the ideal body type is stick thin and blonde. For a long time, Barbie has come under flames for ethical stereotyping and gravely mistaking cultures around the world through incorrect portrayals. Is this what is Barbie teaching children to be? An ignorant person stuck in the mindset of a 1940’s white lady, unknowing of the world around her? All while doing this, Barbie is also a feminist with almost every career in the book and her boyfriend Ken, just as an accessory. With the conflicting actions of the doll comes the question: Is Barbie a good or bad role model? 

Don’t Eat

Barbie is notorious for her unrealistic body and extreme proportions. When asked about her unconventional body, Mattel Inc. replied that “the proportions were created for ease of dressing and undressing the doll, not replicating an adult figure”. While this is the case for dolls, the portrayal of Barbie in her movies, TV shows, books and video games is identical to the thin yet tall body, if not more so. By representing only one body type in all her movies, TV shows, etc., children are learning that the ideal body type, is the thin type.

Furthermore, research published in the journal Body Image found that “girls who played with thin dolls experienced higher body size discrepancies than girls who played with full-figured dolls”. At a young an age, children remember things they are exposed to often and find inspiration in it. The exposure “perpetuate stereotypical messages about weight, beauty, and appearance” and if they are exposed to a pretty doll very often, they become inspired to be just like the doll, even her thin body. One of the most appalling moment regarding Barbie’s body image was when Mattel Inc. released the Slumber Party Barbie that came with a weighing scale permanently set to 110 pounds and a weight loss book with the sole instruction “Don’t Eat”. It is needless to say that Barbie became the poster image of a bad role model after this stunt. 

The New Frontier

Before her big mistake, Barbie was created by Ruth Handler in 1959 to promote the idea that “a woman has choices”, and to break stereotypes. In the beginning, Barbie was a teenage fashion model, but has ever since evolved into more than 200 professions ranging from firefighter to a paleontologist to the first female presidential candidate. The most ambitious of these careers were created in times when a woman was nothing more than housewives. The first Barbie Miss Astronaut was released in in 1965, 4 years before the first man stepped foot on the moon. This was a source of great inspiration for many young girls because for the first time, they were not how to be a mother and a wife. Instead, they were taught to dream and be anything they want.

In January of 2020, Mattel Inc released 176 new Barbies, including a doll in a wheelchair, with prosthetic limbs and a doll without hair. Most popularly, they also released a doll with vitiligo, an autoimmune condition where skin loses its pigment cells resulting in discolored patches all over the body. By doing this, Barbie is well on its way of achieving its goal of inclusivity and diversity by showing a “multidimensional view of beauty and fashion” (Lewis). In 2017, Barbie came out with the first Hijab-wearing doll based on the Olympic fencer Ibtihaj Muhammad and gave a new meaning to their idea of women being anything, they want. In doing so, Barbie is breaking free of stereotypes and by teaching children the progressivity of life, is modeling the frontier of opportunities for women. 

Reality

Mattel Inc. has taken many steps to redeem themselves. Most notably, coming up with a diverse collection of Barbie dolls in an attempt to be more inclusive. The new dolls will be available in “7 different skin tones, 22 eye colors, and 24 hairstyles” (NBC News). This action alone has appeased many of its critics, and coupled with Barbie’s new YouTube channel, where the doll herself has spoken about issues like depression and racism, Barbie is on her way to redemption. It is no surprise that Barbie is controversial. She is everything, from a housewife, to a princess to a model to the first female president of the United States. She is also the alien like woman with a “a 39” bust, an 18” waist, 33” hips and a size 3 shoe”. Due to the constant push and pull on Barbie’s actions, the question still remains: Is Barbie a good or bad role model?  

Cited Sources

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Bellis, Mary. “Biography of Ruth Handler, Inventor of Barbie Dolls.” ThoughtCo,.

Grenoble, Ryan. “PHOTOS: TERRIBLE Advice, Courtesy Of A Barbie From 1965.” HuffPost, HuffPost, 5 Dec. 2012, 

Jellinek, Rebecca D., et al. “The Impact of Doll Style of Dress and Familiarity on Body Dissatisfaction in 6- to 8-Year-Old Girls.” Body Image, Elsevier, 24 June 2016, 

Lewis, Sophie. “Barbie Dolls with No Hair and Vitiligo Added to Mattel’s ‘Most Diverse Doll Line’ Yet.” CBS News, CBS Interactive, 28 Jan. 2020, 

O’Kane, Caitlin. “First Hijab-Wearing Barbie Based on Olympic Fencer Ibtihaj Muhammad.” CBS News, CBS Interactive, 14 Nov. 2017,

 Senior lecturer. “Is Barbie Bad for Body Image?” The Conversation, 12 May 2020,  “1965 Barbie Comes With ‘Don’t Eat’ Diet Book and Scale That Reads 110 Lbs.” Obsessed Magazine,