Associations between appearance-related self-discrepancies and young women's and men's affect, body satisfaction, and emotional eating: a comparison of fixed-item and participant-generated self-discrepancies

Personality & Social Psychology Bulletin
Emma Halliwell, Helga Dittmar

Abstract

This study examines the associations between appearance-related, actual-ideal self-discrepancies--from both own and romantic partner's standpoints--and negative affect, body satisfaction, and eating behavior. It extends previous research through studying both genders and the romantic partner standpoint, but its main novel contribution is a systematic comparison between idiographic, participant-generated, and nomothetic, fixed-item measures of appearance-related self-discrepancies. The findings show that these measures cannot be, and should not be, treated as equivalent. The idiographic measures were superior in predicting outcome variables when considering the own standpoint. Nomothetic measures did demonstrate some gender-specific associations, but only from the romantic partner standpoint, and only for women. These findings can be explained with respect to the assessment of accessible, versus available, self-discrepancies. Implications for self-discrepancy and body image theory and research are discussed.

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Citations

Feb 3, 2016·Eating Behaviors·Ligia OrellanaBerta Schnettler
Apr 12, 2013·Journal of Clinical Nursing·Jo Gilmartin
Apr 7, 2011·The British Journal of Social Psychology·Eleni-Marina Ashikali, Helga Dittmar
Apr 16, 2011·British Journal of Psychology·Tim Woodman, Rebecca Steer
Aug 30, 2019·International Journal of Aging & Human Development·Minsun Lee, Mary Lynn Damhorst
May 27, 2020·Obesity Surgery·D J S MakarawungR Geenen
Jan 23, 2019·Current Obesity Reports·Audrée-Anne Dumas, Sophie Desroches
Dec 20, 2018·The International Journal of Eating Disorders·Ian D StephenKevin R Brooks

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