Rachel M. Calogero

Potential implications of the objectification of women’s bodies for women’s sexual satisfaction.

The present study tested a sociocultural model of womens sexual satisfaction grounded in Objectification Theory (Fredrickson & Roberts, 1997). One hundred and one college women attending university in the UK completed measures of media internalization, body surveillance, body shame, sexual self-esteem, and sexual satisfaction. Consistent with predictions, the results of a path analysis indicated that greater internalization of appearance ideals from media sources leads to more body surveillance, which leads to higher body shame and lower sexual self-esteem, which, in turn, predicts less sexual satisfaction (only reached marginal significance for sexual self-esteem). In addition, body surveillance and body shame directly predicted sexual satisfaction. These results further implicate the sociocultural practices that objectify women in the disruption of womens experiences of sexual satisfaction.

Self-Subjugation Among Women: Exposure to Sexist Ideology, Self-Objectification, and the Protective Function of the Need to Avoid Closure

Despite extensive evidence confirming the negative consequences of self-objectification, direct experimental evidence concerning its environmental antecedents is scarce. Incidental exposure to sexist cues was employed in 3 experiments to investigate its effect on self-objectification variables. Consistent with system justification theory, exposure to benevolent and complementary forms of sexism, but not hostile or no sexism, increased state self-objectification, self-surveillance, and body shame among women but not men in Experiment 1. In Experiment 2, we replicated these effects and demonstrated that they are specific to self-objectification and not due to a more general self-focus. In addition, following exposure to benevolent sexism only, women planned more future behaviors pertaining to appearance management than did men; this effect was mediated by self-surveillance and body shame. Experiment 3 revealed that the need to avoid closure might afford women some protection against self-objectification in the context of sexist ideology.

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 womens self-objectification and body image.

Excessive exercise in eating disorder patients and in healthy women

Objective: In order to elucidate the nature of excessive exercise among individuals with eating disorders, exercise behaviours were compared between eating disorder patients receiving specialist treatment and healthy women, and between subgroups of patients. Methods: Self-report measures of obligatory exercise, motivation for exercise and frequency of hard exercise for weight or shape reasons were completed by eating disorder patients (n=102) and healthy women (n=184). Results: The experience of intense guilt when exercise is missed and exercising solely or primarily for reasons of weight, shape or physical attractiveness, were the exercise behaviours that most clearly differentiated between women with eating disorders and healthy women. Patients with the purging form of anorexia nervosa (n=13) and those with bulimia nervosa (n=41) tended to have higher scores on measures of these behaviours than those with the restricting form of anorexia nervosa (n=15). Conclusions: Research addressing the prevalence and correlates of excessive exercise in eating disorder patients would benefit from a broader assessment of exercise behaviour than has typically been used in previous studies. In addition, the findings may indicate specific targets for the clinical management of excessive exercise as well as for community-based health promotion initiatives.

Development and validation of the Sociocultural Attitudes Towards Appearance Questionnaire-4 (SATAQ-4).

The Sociocultural Attitudes Towards Appearance Questionnaire-3 (SATAQ-3) and its earlier versions are measures designed to assess societal and interpersonal aspects of appearance ideals. Correlational, structural equation modeling, and prospective studies of the SATAQ-3 have shown consistent and significant associations with measures of body image disturbance and eating pathology. In the current investigation, the SATAQ-3 was revised to improve upon some conceptual limitations and was evaluated in 4 U.S. and 3 international female samples, as well as a U.S. male sample. In Study 1, exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses for a sample of women from the Southeastern United States (N = 859) indicated a 22-item scale with 5 factors: Internalization: Thin/Low Body Fat, Internalization: Muscular/Athletic, Pressures: Family, Pressures: Media, Pressures: Peers. This scale structure was confirmed in 3 independent and geographically diverse samples of women from the United States (East Coast N = 440, West Coast N = 304, and North/Midwest N = 349). SATAQ-4 scale scores demonstrated excellent reliability and good convergent validity with measures of body image, eating disturbance, and self-esteem. Study 2 replicated the factorial validity, reliability, and convergent validity of the SATAQ-4 in an international sample of women drawn from Italy, England, and Australia (N = 362). Study 3 examined a sample of college males from the United States (N = 271); the 5-factor solution was largely replicated, yet there was some evidence of an underlying structure unique to men. Future research avenues include additional item testing and modification of the scale for men, as well as adaptation of the measure for children and adolescents.

Objectification Processes and Disordered Eating in British Women and Men

The present study extended the applicability of Objectification Theory to predict disordered eating in British women and men. Participants completed measures of self-objectification, body surveillance, body shame and disordered eating. Path analyses indicated strong support for the theoretical model in women, with body shame fully mediating the relation between self-objectification and disordered eating. Patterns were similar for men with two exceptions; body shame increased with lower self-objectification and disordered eating was directly increased with higher self-objectification. Findings extend Objectification Theory as a useful framework for identifying sociocultural influences on disordered eating in British women and men.

The Practice and Process of Healthy Exercise: An Investigation of the Treatment of Exercise Abuse in Women with Eating Disorders

This study investigates the effectiveness of an exercise program designed to reduce exercise abuse in women who are in residential treatment for eating disorders. One hundred and twenty-seven women who participated in the exercise program were compared to 127 non-participants on weight gain and self-reported obligatory attitudes and beliefs about exercise. The exercise participants were women who were medically cleared and attended at least two exercise groups during treatment. The control group were women who were medically cleared, but did not attend any exercise groups during treatment. Significant group × diagnosis interactions revealed that women in the exercise group who were diagnosed with anorexia nervosa gained more than one-third as much weight as those in the control group. Also, women in the exercise group demonstrated significantly reduced obligatory attitudes toward exercise compared to the control group. These findings suggest that the use of an exercise program that targets exercise abuse in women with eating disorders is feasible during residential treatment and results in positive change without interfering with weight gain. Limitations that result from the lack of random assignment to the exercise and control group are discussed.

The Weight-Inclusive versus Weight-Normative Approach to Health: Evaluating the Evidence for Prioritizing Well-Being over Weight Loss

Using an ethical lens, this review evaluates two methods of working within patient care and public health: the weight-normative approach (emphasis on weight and weight loss when defining health and well-being) and the weight-inclusive approach (emphasis on viewing health and well-being as multifaceted while directing efforts toward improving health access and reducing weight stigma). Data reveal that the weight-normative approach is not effective for most people because of high rates of weight regain and cycling from weight loss interventions, which are linked to adverse health and well-being. Its predominant focus on weight may also foster stigma in health care and society, and data show that weight stigma is also linked to adverse health and well-being. In contrast, data support a weight-inclusive approach, which is included in models such as Health at Every Size for improving physical (e.g., blood pressure), behavioral (e.g., binge eating), and psychological (e.g., depression) indices, as well as acceptability of public health messages. Therefore, the weight-inclusive approach upholds nonmaleficience and beneficience, whereas the weight-normative approach does not. We offer a theoretical framework that organizes the research included in this review and discuss how it can guide research efforts and help health professionals intervene with their patients and community.

Gender and Body Image

That gender has a considerable impact on people’s body image may seem obvious based on the considerable attention paid to women’s and men’s bodies in popular culture (Thompson, Heinberg, Altabe, & Tantleff-Dunn, 1999; Wolf, 1991).

A new archival approach to the study of values and value--behavior relations: validation of the value lexicon.

The present effort employs a new archival approach to study values and value- behavior relations, which is likely to be particularly useful in applied settings. A value lexicon was developed on the basis of the Schwartz (1992) value theory to extract lexical indicators of values from texts. The convergent, discriminant, and predictive validity of this measure was established using American newspaper content from 1900 to 2000 vis-à-vis existing self-report measures of values and objective indicators of value-expressive behaviors. Results provide empirical support for the use of the value lexicon to study values and value- behavior relations. First, the value lexicon demonstrated convergence with self-report responses of values. Second, values in American newspapers were associated with objective indicators of their corresponding value-expressive behaviors compared with noncorresponding value- expressive behaviors. Third, patterns of values over this 101-year period exhibited meaningful fluctuations with major historical and political events. The discussion describes new possibilities for future research on values in many applied settings with the value lexicon. The discussion also suggests that the principles of the value lexicon could be adopted to measure other psychological constructs of interest to applied psychology.