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Introduction
Adolescence is an important period of growth and development during which the skeleton, muscles, and almost every system and organ of the body grow rapidly (Tanner, 1992), leading to an increased demand for energy, protein, and other nutrients (Brabin and Brabin, 1992; Mitchell, 1964; Spear, 2002). Adequate nutrient intake during this rapid growth period is therefore essential for an adolescent to achieve their full growth potential, and insufficient nutritional intake may lead to delayed and stunted linear growth, as well as impaired organ development (Story, 1992). The nutritional intake of female adolescents in particular may be directly related to the health problems of women as they enter childbearing age; previous studies have emphasised the importance of proper nutritional intake during adolescence by assessing the effects of maternal nutrition on the well-being of the foetus after pregnancy and delivery (Aizer and Currie, 2014).
As unrealistic beauty standards become more common, adolescents are gaining distorted ideas that a skinny body is healthy and desirable. As such, this distorted body image perception has caused a serious problem regarding weight loss in adolescents (Kim and Kang, 2007), particularly in females. In a study conducted across Australia and the USA, females, including adolescents, showed a higher tendency of being dissatisfied with their body image than males, leading to more problematic eating behaviours (Ata et al., 2007; Tiggemann, 2005). In the 15th Korea Youth Risk Behaviour Survey 2019, 29.8% of female students with a body mass index (BMI) below the 85th percentile perceived themselves as fat, which was higher than that observed in male students (17.7%) (Ministry of Education et al., 2019). Additionally, 41.6% of students went on a diet in the 30 days preceding the survey (Ministry of Education et al., 2019). Irrational dieting attempts by female adolescents lead to a risk of malnutrition (Her et al., 2003) and may also cause side effects such as irregular menstruation, amenorrhoea, anaemia and osteoporosis (Lee et al., 2005). Furthermore, Markey (2010) emphasised that adolescents who were dissatisfied with their body image were likely to have mental health problems such as low self-esteem and depression as well as eating disorders (Markey, 2010).
The rapid development of social media is expected to further accelerate the spread of irrational...