The phenomenon of body shaming: preliminary results of a study on a group of Italian adolescents

Introduction: Body Shaming (BS) is defined as the act of bullying or insulting people by expressing negative opinions about their physical/body image. BS is reinforced by weight stigma—the discrimination based on a person’s weight —and is particularly prevalent in the school contexts , especially among students with overweight/obesity. Nonetheless, the study of factors associated to weight victimizations in youth is limited; mixed evidence is also available on efficacy of interventions aimed at its reduction. Aim: A pilot study was conducted with the aim of evaluating relationships between relevant factors associated to BS and assessing feasibility of an educational and experiential weight-related teasing prevention program conducted on a group of Italian high-schoolers. Methods: A group of questionnaires was administered at T0 and after four sessions (T1) of intervention to all the students recruited. The preliminary analysis presented here are focused on the Weight Bias Internalization Scale-Modified (WBIS), the Disordered Eating Questionnaire (DEQ), the Attitudes Toward Obese Persons (ATOP) and a questionnaire on Weight-Based Victimization. Results: A sample of 86 students completed the T0 assessment (Mage = 17.22 ± 1.82; 64% M) and 39 participants completed the T1 (Mage = 17.02 ± 1.73; 82% M). History of weight victimizations by peer and family at T0 significantly correlated with DEQ (r = 0.473 and r = 0.331, ps < 0.01, respectively), WBIS (r = 0.541 and r = 0.375, ps < 0.01, respectively) and partially with ATOP (r = 0.284, p < 0.01 and r = 0.020, p = 0.863, respectively). Also, WBI (r = 0.681, p = 0.001) and ATOP (r = 0.197, p = 0.080) were significantly and marginally associated with DEQ, respectively. The paired t-tests assessing mean differences between pre-to-post intervention on the experimental group revealed a decreasing trend in some aspects, although not statistically significant, probably due to low statistical power (see Table 1). Discussion and conclusions: Findings showed that the more adolescents experienced weight stigma and victimizations, the more they reported disordered eating symptoms. The preliminary results on the intervention are encouraging in supporting the reduction of BS-related factors after this pilot program, supporting feasibility and the implementation of the program on a larger sample size.