For as little as $55 a week over five years, the teenagers – most fresh out of high school with full-time jobs – are paying for breast implants costing between $8000 and $10,000.

Over the past three years the number of women aged under 20 undergoing cosmetic surgery has increased by 30 per cent, says the Gold Coast's self-styled queen of cosmetic surgery Pamela Noon.

"The accessibility to finance has increased the younger market," Noon says. "You're talking thousands of dollars for these procedures and previously younger girls couldn't afford it."

"I did get a bit of discount because I was working there," she says. "But I still had to get a loan to pay for it. It's costing me about $50 a fortnight at the moment but it's definitely been worth it."

She says she was initially a bit hesistant about getting breast implants but after gettinga job in the industry the temptation was too great and she thought "now's the time to get it done".

"They were just that big but when the swelling went down I thought 'This is great'. I could wear tops that I'd never thought of wearing before and bikins fit so well."

The growing trend in teens willing to put themselves under the knife to reshape their bodies was highlighted this week in reality TV's Big Brother house.

Her decision to boost her breasts from a C to D cup to improve her self-confidence was done with the blessing of her mother, Karen, who also is appearing in the show and has implants.

"The mother usually comes in first for a facelift or some liposuction and they say 'My daughter's thinking of having this or that done. Can you see her?' . . . We've had girls as young as 16 having their breasts done.

The Australian Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS) is concerned that an increasing number of teenagers, bombarded by airbrushed images and unrealistsic representations of beauty, are being driven by peer pressure to have cosmetic surgery.

A recent study in Britain found that by the age of 12, three-quarters of girls disliked something about their appearance and, by 16, one in four were considering cosmetic surgery.

ASPS Gold Coast spokesman Dr Craig Layt says the rise in teenage girls opting for cosmetic surgery is part of an overall increase in demand for such procedures.

"There's been an increase in cosmetic surgery generally and I think this is just part of that rather than a whole lot of young girls suddenly deciding 'I've got to get bigger boobs'," he said.

According to the latest figures from the International Society of Aesthetic Plastic Surgery, the number of plastic surgery patients aged under 20 has remained stable at 12 per cent over the past four years.

"But we don't go running around (doing) breast augmentation (for) girls who we believe are not physically and emotionally mature enough to have it done."

Sydney-based lecturer in cultural and media studies Meredith Jones says cosmetic surgery is part of a wider social phenomenon she calls "makeover culture".

"We've seen it in all sorts of areas and all sorts of reality TV shows like Backyard Blitz, The Biggest Loser and Extreme Makeover," she says. "It's a way for people to show that they're happening people, that they're always improving themselves, that they're always in a process of regeneration, renovation and restoration."

In a paper she wrote entitled 'Mutton cut up as lamb: Mothers, daughters and cosmetic surgery', Jones observed: "While the daughter may use cosmetic surgery to escape the tyranny of her mother's genes and to distance her from her aesthetic fate, the mother concurrently uses cosmetic surgery to come closer to how the daughter looks".

We welcome your comments on this story. Comments are submitted for possible publication on the condition that they may be edited. Please provide your full name and suburb/location. We also require a working email address - not for publication, but for verification. The telephone field is optional.

This is cache, read story here