Last week the Psych Central newsroom had a story about self-esteem and a reduced need for antidepressant medication following plastic surgery. The sample was primarily middle aged women who received non-essential cosmetic surgery such as face lifts and breat augmentation. On the surface this makes some sense. If a person is bothered by a psysical feature enough to seek surgery to change it, then it is expected that the person would get a mood boost after it was completed. However, drawing this type of conclusion is flawed. For people that are chronically dissatisfied with their appearance, an alteration would provide a temporary self-esteem increase. However, if the underlying issue of equating one’s self-worth with appearance is not worked on, then this mood increase will eventually fade back to a baseline of dissatisfaction, and a new negative object of obsession to be fixed. Clearly this type of data benefits the plastic surgery industry (they comissioned the study), but I would argue that is offers a false promise to many patients considering these types of surgery.
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Last reviewed: By John M. Grohol, Psy.D. on 16 Oct 2006
