Connecting theory to fat talk: body dissatisfaction mediates the relationships between weight discrepancy, upward comparison, body surveillance, and fat talk

Abstract

The fat talk literature is meager in terms of offering theoretical explanations for women's self-disparaging communication. The research presented here sought to establish a relationship between three prominent body image theories - self-discrepancy theory, social comparison theory, and objectification theory - and fat talk by proposing body dissatisfaction as a potential mediating mechanism. Young adult women (N=201) completed an online questionnaire. As predicted, results revealed that body dissatisfaction significantly mediated the relationships between weight discrepancy, upward comparison, body surveillance and fat talk. Effect size estimates indicated that the size of each indirect effect was medium in magnitude.

Keywords: Body dissatisfaction; Fat talk; Objectification theory; Self-discrepancy theory; Social comparison theory.