The Effects of Playing with Thin Dolls on Body Image and Food Intake in Young Girls

This study experimentally tested the effects of playing with thin dolls on body image and food intake in 6- to 10-year-old Dutch girls (N = 117). Girls were randomly assigned to play with a thin doll, an average-sized doll, or Legos in a no doll control condition. After 10 min, they participated in a taste-test and completed questionnaires about body image. No differences were found between conditions for any of the body image variables. However, girls who played with the average-sized doll ate significantly more food than girls in other exposure conditions. Although no support was found for the assumption that playing with thin dolls influences body image, the dolls directly affected actual food intake in these young girls

More than just child’s play?: An experimental investigation of the impact of an appearance-focused internet game on body image and career aspirations of young girls

© 2017, The Author(s). In recent years, elements of the modern environment (such as television, Internet, toys and clothes) have been criticized for having an increasingly sexualized or appearance focus, which has been suggested to be detrimental to girls’ development. The current study examined the impact of an appearance-focused Internet game on young girls’ body image and career cognitions and aspirations. Eighty British girls aged 8–9 years were randomly assigned to play an appearance-focused or a non-appearance focused game for 10 minutes. Girls in the appearance-focused game condition displayed greater body dissatisfaction compared to the control condition. Type of game did not impact girls’ perceived capacity to do various jobs. However, girls who played the appearance-focused game reported a greater preference for feminine careers compared to the control group. This provides preliminary evidence that appearance-focused Internet games may be detrimental to young girls’ body image and aspirations. Internet games should be included in our consideration of influential messages for young girls

Complimentary weightism: The potential costs of appearance-related commentary for women’s self-objectification

Little is known about the effects of receiving compliments about appearance. An ethnically diverse sample of 220 college women completed self-report measures of appearance commentary, trait self-objectification, body surveillance, and body dissatisfaction. Results indicated that the impact of appearance criticisms and compliments, but not their frequency, predicted higher body surveillance and more body dissatisfaction. Moderated mediation analyses indicated that increased body surveillance partially explained the relationship between feelings about appearance comments and body dissatisfaction and that this effect was moderated by level of trait self-objectification. Higher self-objectifying women reported higher levels of body surveillance and more body dissatisfaction regardless of whether they felt positively or negatively about the appearance comments, whereas lower self-objectifying women were less stable in their reports. Importantly, all women reported higher body surveillance and more body dissatisfaction in association with feeling good about receiving appearance compliments, which supports the idea of complimentary weightism, whereby appearance compliments represent a seemingly innocuous type of interpersonal feedback that may have detrimental consequences for women\u27s self-objectification and body image

Fat Stigmatization in Television Shows and Movies: A Content Analysis

Objective: To examine the phenomenon of fat stigmatization messages presented in television shows and movies, a content analysis was used to quantify and categorize fat‐specific commentary and humor. Research Methods and Procedures: Fat stigmatization vignettes were identified using a targeted sampling procedure, and 135 scenes were excised from movies and television shows. The material was coded by trained raters. Reliability indices were uniformly high for the seven categories (percentage agreement ranged from 0.90 to 0.98; kappas ranged from 0.66 to 0.94). Results: Results indicated that fat stigmatization commentary and fat humor were often verbal, directed toward another person, and often presented directly in the presence of the overweight target. Results also indicated that male characters were three times more likely to engage in fat stigmatization commentary or fat humor than female characters. Discussion: To our knowledge, these findings provide the first information regarding the specific gender, age, and types of fat stigmatization that occur frequently in movies and television shows. The stimuli should prove useful in future research examining the role of individual difference factors (e.g., BMI) in the reaction to viewing such vignettes