and in the workplace. This reflects the fact that women in today's society have more control over what they look like than they did in years past. In the 1960s women celebrated liberation by wearing skimpy mini skirts, in the '70s bohemian fashion emerged thanks to the feminist movement, and in the '80s the fight for equality in the workplace led many women to choose attire that drew less attention to their bodies. Plus-size women in the fashion industry The hourglass figure is perhaps the most iconic of the four major body shapes, as reflected by the fashion industry. Such fashion designers as Christian Dior have designed clothes with the female hourglass body shape in mind. Fashion designers of today continue to design clothes to fit the hourglass body shape even though the body shapes of modern women are changing and becoming much more varied. Even now when plus-size is included in the fashion industry as well as being more commonly produced by various groups of clothing designers, the hourglass shape is a great influence on the design of plus-sized clothes. Models of plus size clothing retain the coveted hourglass figure, albeit larger than the models of regular clothing. Research conducted in Britain by the University College London and the London College of Fashion found that less than 10% of women had an hourglass body shape. The smooth and narrow waist continues to dominate in fashion designs meant to cater to plus-size women even when that particular body shape, the hourglass, is not commonly found. Research Recent research indicates that men have a marked preference for women who have the hourglass figure. These studies found that this shape was even more highly preferred than breast size or facial features. While it is true that most men were initially drawn to a woman's cleavage, it was her hips and waist that were in fact what they found the most attractive. Scientists observed that the most desirable waist-to-hip ratio was 0.7- a waist that measures 70 percent of the circumference of the hips. Some examples of women who possess or have possessed the "perfect" body were Marilyn Monroe, Jessica Alba and Alessandra Ambrosio. A scientist on one of the studies speculated that the 0.7 ratio might signal female fertility. Recent studies have shown that only about 8 percent of women today have the sort of hourglass figure flaunted by curvaceous 1950s film