School of Psychology, UNSW Sydney, Sydney, NSW, 2052 Australia.
Body Image. 2022 Mar;40:124-130. doi: 10.1016/j.bodyim.2021.12.001. Epub 2021 Dec 17.
Exposure to images of idealized bodies in the media has been shown to increase body dissatisfaction among women. One of the mechanisms through which exposure influences body dissatisfaction is appearance-based comparison with the people in the images. The present study tested the hypothesis that individuals low in self-concept clarity (i.e., individuals who lack a clear sense of their own identity) would be more likely to compare themselves to images of thin models, and would consequently experience greater body dissatisfaction. White female participants (N = 489) were exposed to either images featuring idealized bodies or neutral control images, and then indicated the extent to which they compared their appearance to that of the targets and reported their level of body dissatisfaction. A moderated-mediation model showed that the effect of exposure condition on body dissatisfaction via appearance comparison to the targets depended on the participant's level of self-concept clarity. Those with lower self-concept clarity engaged in greater comparison when exposed to idealized images relative to control images, leading to greater post-exposure body dissatisfaction. These findings suggest that low self-concept clarity might increase vulnerability to the negative effects of exposure to idealized media images.
媒体中理想化身体的形象曝光已被证明会增加女性的身体不满。暴露影响身体不满的机制之一是基于外观与图像中的人进行比较。本研究检验了这样一个假设，即自我概念清晰度低的个体（即缺乏清晰自我认同感的个体）更有可能将自己与瘦模特的形象进行比较，从而导致更大的身体不满。白人女性参与者（N=489）接触理想化身体的形象或中性控制图像，然后表明他们在多大程度上将自己的外表与目标进行比较，并报告他们的身体不满程度。一个有调节的中介模型表明，暴露条件对身体不满的影响，通过与目标的外观比较，取决于参与者的自我概念清晰度水平。与控制图像相比，自我概念清晰度较低的人在接触理想化图像时会进行更多的比较，从而导致更多的曝光后身体不满。这些发现表明，低自我概念清晰度可能会增加对理想化媒体图像暴露的负面影响的脆弱性。
