Women’s self-estimates of body size are more accurate and precise when made with three-quarter view than front-view stimuli

Cornelissen, Piers, Brokjøb, Lise, Gumančík, Jiří and Cornelissen, Katri (2021) Women’s self-estimates of body size are more accurate and precise when made with three-quarter view than front-view stimuli. Body Image, 38. pp. 171-180. ISSN 1740-1445

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Official URL: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bodyim.2021.04.003

Abstract

Recently, Cornelissen, Cornelissen, Groves, McCarty, & Tovée (2018) asked which image orientations (e.g. front-, side-, or three-quarter view) are most appropriate for tasks which are used for self-estimates of body size and shape. Based on psychophysical measurements, they showed that front view stimuli showed substantially poorer content validity compared to side- and three-quarter view stimuli. Here, we tested the real-world consequences of Cornelissen et al.’s (2018) findings. We carried out a body size self-estimation task in a sample of healthy adult women, once with front view stimuli, and once with three-quarter view stimuli. The order in which front- and three-quarter view tasks were carried out was randomized across participants. Compared to three-quarter view stimuli, we found that: a) the precision of participants’ judgements was worse with front view stimuli, and b) that front view stimuli led to over-estimation of body size by ~1.7 BMI units. While these results need to be replicated, they do suggest that careful consideration needs to be given to stimulus orientation in future studies.

Item Type: Article
Additional Information: Funding Information: LGB was funded by Northumbria University as an RA.
Uncontrolled Keywords: BMI, Body fat, Body size judgement, Viewpoint, Figural body scales
Subjects: C800 Psychology
L900 Others in Social studies
Department: Faculties > Health and Life Sciences > Psychology
Depositing User: John Coen
Date Deposited: 20 Apr 2021 08:23
Last Modified: 21 Oct 2022 08:01
URI: https://nrl.northumbria.ac.uk/id/eprint/45956

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