Nina Stupar is a third-year political science and history major at the University of Toronto (U of T), and she has been dancing since she was two years old.
She says the first time she was made to feel her weight was related to talent was when she was nine years old and had the flu.
“I was eating saltine crackers and water for a whole week and I come back for my ballet ‘solo private,’” said Stupar. “So, she said to me, I’m so happy that you finally lost a little bit of weight.”
She says the other dancers her age struggled with body image and eating habits. Her best friend once refused a cupcake and told the birthday girl’s mom, “’sorry, that doesn’t go with my diet’, and she was 11.”
Stupar is captain of the U of T dance team and has found there is less of an eating disorder culture in university.
She says she focuses on building strength rather than having perfect aesthetics.
“We always try to frame it as we’re doing this workout so that we’re better at this other skill, not being, like, we’re doing abs so that we’re all skinny and thin by [competition],” said Stupar.
The culture shift she’s seeing in university is one researchers are studying.
Research conducted in Norway has looked at mental health challenges and injuries in professional dancers in their early 20s.
The study found there’s a need for improved knowledge about nutrition and body weight regulations to support better body acceptance.
Therese Fostervold Mathisen is a dietitian, an exercise physiologist and a health sciences professor at Østfold University College in Norway.
Her 2022 study in dance education focuses on better understanding the root causes of mental health challenges in young dancers and the systemic challenges of changing these behaviours.
In a pre-evaluation which was never published, they noticed a high frequency of these issues in the students dance instructors.
“What I noticed in the pre-evaluation where most of the [instructors] were responding, there seemed to be a culture normalized saying that you should actually live with the pain,” said Fostervold Mathisen. “You should feel the pain as a dancer because to be a dancer is to live painfully.”
The study revealed out of 124 dance students, 20 to 54 per cent of participants had symptoms of anxiety, depression or eating disorders.
Fostervold Mathisen said body appreciation is how much a person values and appreciates their body.
Dancers in her study struggled with appreciation, possibly as a result of complying with the dance culture that says dancers must look a certain way.
She said the language instructors use with their students can have a direct impact on how dancers view their body.
“So, one thing is about how we use the language to communicate the performance, but another thing is that you actually acknowledge that we do have a problem with our culture and we should work towards a better culture,” said Fostervold Mathisen.
She adds dancers within the study were more likely to be aware of physical symptoms they were facing but not address the mental ones.
Dr. Eric Stice created an intervention program called The Body Project. It includes four weekly interventions designed to help university-aged students who identify as female break from the systemic pressures of having the ideal body.
This project has been adapted to help dancers with their own body image and reduce body dissatisfaction.
“The adoption is about making sure that the program addresses the specific struggles that the individuals are coping with,” Fostervold Mathisen. “So, the project has also been adapted for pro dancers, for male athletes and we just recently adapted for adolescents being 13 to 14 years of age.”
She said interventions such as The Body Project are not enough to garner change within the dance community. She said there needs to be a systemic change and adaptation where tall and lean bodies are not the gold standard for dancers.