Perceived and imagined body image distortion: a possible factor for obesity and overweight in Mexicans
Main Article Content
Keywords
Body image, Self concept, Body mass index, Overweight, Obesity
Abstract
Background: Obesity, as an effect of the nutritional transition in developing countries, has become one of México’s greatest public health problems. Body image distortion is one of the possible causes of this socially generalized issue. The aim of this study was to obtain three indicators (the representation of the imagined body, the perceived image of the body, and the body mass index —BMI—) to compare them and know the differences between the real image (BMI) and the other two images.
Methods: Inaccuracy of body size estimation was measured through a survey with a ranked scale to determine if the sample (n = 579) had body image distortion, what degree of distortion had, and how body image distortion behaved across age groups from 15 to 69 years old.
Results: The age group from 15 to 19 years old was found to be significantly different from all other age groups through a Kruskal-Wallis test. Differences between men and women were found through a Mann-Whitney test. A relation was found between types of body image distortion and the degree of distortion with a multinomial logistic regression model.
Conclusion: Cultural factors could help to explain these findings. If the inaccuracy of body size estimation can be associated to obese and overweight Mexicans in the future, these results will be critical for the analysis of such an epidemic.
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