Three Beijing women practice belly dance in a club in Beijing in this September 7, 2005 photo. A survey has found that Beijing women have a sexier self-image than women in Shanghai. [newsphoto]

SHANGHAI: The results are in: Beijing women have a sexier self-image than their counterparts in Shanghai and Guangzhou.

A recent survey shows 33 percent of young women in Beijing think they are sexy, compared to only 24 percent in Shanghai and 15 percent in Guangzhou.

The British advertising agency Bartle Bogle Hegarty (BBH) and consumer research company Jigsaw International polled 1,000 women between the ages of 15 and 35 in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou for the "China Whispers" survey.

But not everyone agreed with the results. "To me, Shanghai women are more sexy than Beijing women," said Ying Yan, a 30-year-old woman who has lived in both cities.

"More Beijing women think they are sexy because they're more confident about saying so. Shanghai women are more shy about saying such things."

Only 37 percent of the respondents said they would never consider going under the knife for plastic surgery. And the epic battle to drop a dress size seems to be universal, with 42 percent having tried to lose weight in the past three months.

"The consumer-scape in China changes at a speed which often catches marketers out," said Pete Heskett, head of planning at BBH China.

The survey's goal was to identify the lifestyles, attitudes and pop culture preferences of young people in major cities.

The results showed that young Chinese shoppers have ever deeper pockets, with 52 percent saying they had spent more than 1,000 yuan on a single item of clothing recently.

Young people seem to have increasingly progressive attitudes towards their diets, with 67 percent ready to buy organic produce, even if it meant paying 25 percent more, reflecting a keen sense of the link between food safety and personal health. The respondents' favourite foreign cuisine was Japanese, followed by Korean.

When it came to viewing habits, Western imports were preferred, with 39 percent youths saying they had seen Prison Break and 20 percent having followed Lost. These tallies were perhaps unexpected, for these shows are officially not shown on any network in China.