TEST DEVELOPMENT

VARIABLE: “BODY SHAMING”

Submitted To:

Dr Tasnim Rehna

Submitted By:

Bushra Sultana Jamal

Faiqa Rahman

Hooria Ashraf

Sumaika Ishtiaq

Syeda Aiman Fatima

MSc. Applied Psychology – II (Morning)

DEPARTMENT OF APPLIED PSYCHOLOGY

NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF MODERN LANGUAGES. ISLAMABAD

INTRODUCTION

Definition and concept …………………….………………………………………………….2

Types of body shaming………….……………….……………………………………………2

Literature Review……………………………………………………………………………...3

Theoretical Model related to body shaming…………………………………………………...5

METHODOLOGY

Need Identification…………………………………………………………………………….7

Role of Theory………………………………………………………………………………...7

Test Specifications…………………………………………………………………………….7

Item Writing...…………………………………………………………………………………8

Subject Matter Expert Review………………………………………………………………...8

Finalization of Scale.………………………………………………………………………….8

BODY SHAMING SCALE.………….………….………...………………….…………......10

REFERENCES ………………………………………………………………………………14

1
CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

DEFINITION OF BODY SHAMING

Body shaming in simple words means to criticize oneself or others based on their physical

appearance which leads to a vicious cycle of judgments and criticisms that may or may not

affect their mental health. The scope of body shaming is wide, and can include, although is not

limited to fat-shaming, shaming for thinness, height-shaming, shaming of hairiness (or lack

thereof), of hair-colour, body-shape, one's muscularity (or lack thereof), shaming of looks

(facial features),

TYPES OF BODY SHAMING

Body-shaming manifests in many ways:

1. Criticizing your own appearance, through a judgment or comparison to another person.

(i.e.: “I’m so ugly compared to her.” “Look at how broad my shoulders are.”)

2. Criticizing another’s appearance in front of them, (i.e.: “With those thighs, you’re never

going to find a date.”)

3. Criticizing another’s appearance without their knowledge. (i.e.: “Did you see what she’s

wearing today? Not flattering.” “At least you don’t look like her!”).

RELATED TERMS

Body image- is mental and emotional: it’s both the mental picture that you have of your body

and the way you feel about your body when you look in a mirror.

Self-esteem- is how you value and respect yourself as a person—it is the opinion that you have

of yourself inside and out. Self-esteem impacts how you take care of yourself, emotionally,

physically, and spiritually. Self-esteem is about your whole self, not just your body.

Body image and self-esteem directly influence each other—and your feelings, thoughts, and

behaviours. If you don’t like your body (or a part of your body), it’s hard to feel good about

2
your whole self. The reverse is also true: if you don’t value yourself, it’s hard to notice the

good things and give your body the respect it deserves.

LITERATURE REVIEW

For human beings, there is more important than judgment about self and this evaluation

becomes the most definitive factor in the process of psychological development. Perceptual

component for body shaming is that how we see our size, figure, and weight, face, movement

and actions, while the viewing/ outlook parts are that how we feel regarding these features and

how our feelings direct our behaviour.

Body shaming and social phobia

Research on psychological factors that are related to body shaming, Izgiç, Akyüz, Dogcaron,

and Kugcaron (2004) found that individuals who had suffered from a social phobia in the past

were at high risk of suffering from lower body shaming. Also, increased levels of social

comparison, that is, an increased tendency to evaluate self by comparing to others is linked to

an increased risk of low body image satisfaction.

In a study that explored the interaction between parental and peer relationships with body

shaming concern Holsen et al. found that good quality relationships with parents and peers

were associated with higher levels of body satisfaction. However, poor quality relationships

with parents and peers were associated with lower body satisfaction. Several researchers

highlight the importance of the role of parents to improve body shaming amongst young people.

Fathers and mothers can influence body shaming in positive directions through words of

encouragement and praise and negative directions through criticism. Especially the case for

girls.

Individuals feel pressurised by society to achieve an ideal body and are more likely to have

lower body satisfaction than individuals who do not feel pressurised. Especially females appear

3
to be more likely to feel pressurised to have an ideal body than males and will hence often

‘internalise’ it.

Body shaming and weight

Body shaming also include Fat shaming which is harmful to health and may drive weight gain.

Anti-fat bias is rampant in all parts of society, including medicine, More than three in five

adults with obesity encounter weight bias from health professionals, according to Obesity

Canada. Some medical ethicists even argue that this social pressure is justified to promote

weight loss.

Fat shaming is also linked to depression, anxiety, low self-esteem, eating disorders and exercise

avoidance, Alberga said. There’s emerging evidence that the severity of harm increases when

people internalize weight bias and turn it on themselves. In one study, participants with high

levels of internalization of weight-bias had three times greater odds of having metabolic

syndrome than those with low levels, even after controlling for BMI and other risk factors.

Body shaming and social media

Negative influences caused by social media and in the fashion industry. This explains how

these two combined forces can causes the average women to view themselves poorly. In

comparison to these perfect and unrealistic versions of beauty that media displays and the idea

behind the perfect body. Social media has pressured women to fit into what society portrays as

beautiful and perfect, these outside influences have led to eating disorders and health issues.

In history women have gone through all different types of extremes to fit society’s idea of

perfection in their looks and body appearance. The average American women bodies that are

most admired are models on magazines that are shown throughout social media. Today those

women are shown to be consistently slimmer compared to the average American woman. There

have been recent studies and discoveries that the women that are shown in social media on

average are ten times smaller and slimmer than that of the average woman today. This is the

4
main problem as to why girls and especial young woman have problems accepting their natural

bodies and beauty.

Body shaming and bullying

Statistics indicate that 94% of teenage girls have been body shamed. Additionally, according

to the National Eating Disorders Association, about 65% of people with eating disorders say

that bullying contributed to their condition. These are high statistics, and not in a good way.

Body-shaming, fat-shaming, thin-shaming, etc., IS a form of bullying that can occur in person,

on-line, in group-conversations, by gossiping, etc. It is a wide-spread occurrence in our culture

that has long-lasting physical, emotional, and social effects.

Overweight and even underweight children and adolescents tend to be at higher risk for being

bullied. The torment that takes place is not by just the “mean girls” at school. It can be from

friends, coaches and as subtle as teasing by family members.

THEORETICAL MODEL RELATED TO BODY SHAMING

1. Social comparison theory

This theory was first proposed in 1954 by psychologist Leon Festinger and suggested that

people have an innate drive to evaluate themselves, often in comparison to others. People make

all kinds of judgments about themselves, and one of the keyways that we do this is through

social comparison or analysing the self in relation to others.

For example, imagine that a high school student has just signed up for band class to learn how

to play the clarinet. As she evaluates her skills and progress, she will compare her performance

to other students in the class.

She might initially compare her abilities to the other members of the clarinet section,

particularly noting those who are better than her as well as those who are worse. She may also

compare her abilities to those of students who play other instruments as well.

5
Psychologist Leon Festinger believed that we engage in this comparison process as a way of

establishing a benchmark by which we can make accurate evaluations of ourselves. The social

comparison process involves people coming to know themselves by evaluating their own

attitudes, abilities, and traits in comparison with others. In most cases, we try to compare

ourselves to those in our peer group or with whom we are similar.

2. Self-Objectification theory

This theory proposes that as the social norms and objectification of the female body are more

common, women are disproportionally affected; e.g. it proposes that there is a cultural

emphasis on how women's bodies look versus how men's bodies act.

As such females come to place greater value on how they look to others, rather than how they

feel or what they can do. This externalized view of the self is accompanied by self-

consciousness characterised by vigilant monitoring of one's appearance, chronic body

monitoring is referred to as self-surveillance (also referred to as body surveillance).

6
CHAPTER 2

METHODOLOGY

NEED IDENTIFICATION

Specific norms for an ideal body shape have been set in our society. Social media has provoked

this issue by presenting the picture of an idealized body shape and size in the form of models.

So, to gain social acceptance people have started criticizing their bodies which has given rise

to body shaming. But still, not much attention is being paid to this issue. We also observed a

lack of research work available on this issue so we realized a need to develop a test on body

shaming in order to address this prevailing issue in society to aware people regarding this major

problem and to assist clinical practitioners to measure the level of body shaming faced by the

individuals in our society so that they can apply therapeutic techniques to help the individuals

facing body shaming.

ROLE OF THE THEORY

Different theories are available related to our scale ‘Body Shaming’. But we have based our

test by following the literature. The source of our ideas is based on the literature review. Our

main idea is that; “Body shaming is the result of self-criticism in comparison to others as well

as being criticized by others” The items consist of the ideas of criticizing oneself or others

based on their physical appearance in terms of their body shape, size, complexion, height and

weight.

TEST SPECIFICATIONS

The test is an Individual test. It is a self-report questionnaire. It is specifically designed to

measure the extent to which an individual experiences body shaming. The test contains

sufficient items to indicate the level of body shaming index possessed by an individual. The

questionnaire includes 35 items scored on a 5-point Likert scale where 1 indicates ‘strongly

agree’, 2 indicates ‘agree’, 3 indicates ‘neutral’, 4 indicates ‘disagree’ and 5 indicates ‘strongly

7
disagree’. Each item is graded on this scale and then all the scores are added together to give

the total score for the subjects. According to this scale, the high score indicates higher level of

body shaming, while a low score indicates lower level of body shaming experienced by an

individual.

ITEM WRITING

On the basis of literature previously reported, we generated 48 items and made sure that there

are no ambiguous, irrelevant, double barreled or double negative items. Also no such words

are used that a person cannot understand or interpret. All the items written are clear, to the point

and easy to understand. There is no confusing item and each item has its own meaning. In the

item writing process, we have selected the Urdu language as it is our mother tongue and can

be easily understood by the local people so it can be administered in our society. Moreover, we

have great command on this language.

SUBJECT MATTER EXPERT REVIEW

After generating the questionnaire, we requested the Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) to review

our scale for any technical issues in the items. We requested them to review the content of the

scale for any ambiguous, irrelevant, double-barreled items and sufficiency of the items etc. so

that the quality of our scale can be improved.

FINALIZATION OF SCALE

On the basis of feedback provided by the experts, we finalized the items. Initially the total

number of items generated were 42 and after incorporating the suggestions provided by the

expert, 12 items were discarded because they were being repeated and were irrelevant to the

variable (Body Shaming) being measured, 4 items were rephrased in order to give the proper

meaning of the context, 2 items were added about surgery to include another domain of

transformation about our variable of body shaming and 3 items were added to equally represent

the male gender as well because the scale was reviewed as insufficient for the male gender. So

8
after incorporating all the suggestions from the expert’s review, 35 items were finalized of the

scale to test in the main study which will be conducted in the future.

9
‫‪BODY SHAMING SCALE‬‬

‫میں نیشنل یونیورسٹی آف ماڈرن لینگویجز میں ایم ‪-‬ایس‪-‬سی کی طالبہ ہوں۔ میں ایک تحقیق پر کام‬

‫کر رہِی ہوں جو میری ڈگری کی تکمیل کا ضروری حصہ ہے۔ اس سلسلے میں آپ کا تعاون درکار‬

‫ہے۔ آپ کو اس تحقیق کا حصہ بننے یا نہ بننے پر مکمل اختیار حاصل ہے۔ اور آپ اس سوال نامے‬

‫کو حل کرتے ہوئے کسی بھی وقت چھوڑ کر جا سکتے ہیں۔‬

‫آپ کا تعاون یقینا میرے لیے بہت مدد گار ہوگا۔‬

‫شکریہ‬

‫ہدایات‪:‬‬

‫مندرجہ ذیل سواالت کو غور سے پڑھیں اور بتائیں کہ آپ ان سے کس حد تک متفق یا غیر متفق‬

‫ہیں۔ ہر بیان کےآگے دیئے گئے جوابات میں سے کسی ایک پردرست کا نشان لگائیں۔‬

‫مکمل طور‬ ‫غیر‬ ‫معلوم‬ ‫متفق‬ ‫مکمل‬ ‫سواالت‬ ‫نمبر‬

‫پر غیر متفق‬ ‫متفق‬ ‫نہیں‬ ‫طور‬ ‫شمار‬

‫پر‬

‫متفق‬

‫میں خوبصورت نظر آنا چاہتی ‪ /‬چاہتا ہوں۔‬ ‫‪۱‬‬

‫میں اپنے پاؤں چھپانے کہ لئے بند جوتے پہنتا ‪ /‬پہنتی‬ ‫‪2‬‬

‫ہوں۔‬

‫‪10‬‬
‫اگر مجھے موقع مال تو میں اپنے جسم میں کچھ تبدیلیاں‬ ‫‪3‬‬

‫الزمی کرؤنگا ‪ /‬کرؤنگی۔‬

‫میری رنگت میری شادی میں ایک بڑی رکاوٹ ہے۔‬ ‫‪4‬‬

‫میں ا پنےجسم کی بناوٹ سے ناخوش ہوں۔‬ ‫‪5‬‬

‫میری ٹانگیں میرے جسم کہ مقابلے میں موٹی ہیں۔‬ ‫‪6‬‬

‫میں اپنے کم بال چھپانے کہ لئے سر کو ڈھانپ کے‬ ‫‪7‬‬

‫رکھتی ‪ /‬رکھتا ہوں۔‬

‫میرا وزن میرے قد کہ حساب سے ٹھیک نہیں ہے۔‬ ‫‪8‬‬

‫میں شوخ رنگ اس لیے پہنتا ‪ /‬پہنتی ہوں تاکہ اس میں‬ ‫‪9‬‬

‫خوبصورت لگوں۔‬

‫میں اپنے جسم سے مطمئن نہیں ہوں۔‬ ‫‪10‬‬

‫مجھے موٹے لوگ پسند نہیں ہیں۔‬ ‫‪11‬‬

‫میرے دوست اور رشتے دار مجھ سے ذیادہ خوبصورت‬ ‫‪12‬‬

‫ہیں۔‬

‫میرا وزن میری شادی میں بڑی رکاوٹ ہے۔‬ ‫‪13‬‬

‫میں ایسے کپڑے خریدتی ‪ /‬خریدتا ہوں جس میں پتلی‪/‬‬ ‫‪14‬‬

‫پتال لگؤں۔‬

‫‪11‬‬
‫میں روزانہ رنگ گورا کرنے والی کریم استعمال کرتا‪/‬‬ ‫‪15‬‬

‫کرتی ہوں۔‬

‫میں ماڈلز کی طرح نظر آنا چاہتا ‪ /‬چاہتی ہوں۔‬ ‫‪16‬‬

‫میں باہر جانے سے پہلے تیار ہونے میں وقت لگاتا ‪/‬‬ ‫‪17‬‬

‫لگاتی ہوں۔‬

‫میں ان لوگوں کے ساتھ زیادہ وقت گزارتا ‪ /‬گزارتی ہوں‬ ‫‪18‬‬

‫جو مجھ پر تنقید نہیں کرتے۔‬

‫میں اپنی تصاویر میں بہتری النے کہ لیئےان میں ترمیم‬ ‫‪19‬‬

‫کرتی‪ /‬کرتا ہوں۔‬

‫اگر میری آنکھیں تھوڑی زیادہ بڑی ہوتیں تو میں زیادہ‬ ‫‪20‬‬

‫اچھی لگتی‪ /‬اچھا لگتا۔‬

‫میں اپنے جسم کے حوالے سے مسلسل پریشان رہتا ‪/‬‬ ‫‪21‬‬

‫رہتی ہوں۔‬

‫میں خوبصورت لگنے کہ لئے سجتی سنورتی‪ /‬سجتا‬ ‫‪22‬‬

‫سنورتا ہوں۔‬

‫مجھے لگتا ہے کہ میری رنگت کی وجہ سے کم لوگ‬ ‫‪23‬‬

‫مجھ سے دوستی کرتے ہیں۔‬

‫میرے ظاہری خدوخال میں بہت سی خامیاں ہیں۔‬ ‫‪24‬‬

‫‪12‬‬
‫میں کالے رنگ کے کپڑوں میں پتلی لگتی ‪/‬پتال لگتا ہوں۔‬ ‫‪25‬‬

‫میں اپنی رنگت سے مطمئن نہیں ہوں۔‬ ‫‪26‬‬

‫میں اپنی جسامت کی وجہ سے لوگوں کے‬ ‫‪27‬‬

‫سامنےشرمندگی محسوس کرتا‪/‬کرتی ہوں۔‬

‫احساس کمتری میں‬

‫مبتال ہوجاتا ‪ /‬جاتی ہوں۔‬

‫مجھے اپنی جسامت میں بہتری النے کے لئے جم جانا‬ ‫‪29‬‬

‫پڑتا ہے۔‬

‫میں لمبا دکھنے کے لئے اونچے جوتے پہنتا ‪ /‬پہنتی ہوں۔‬ ‫‪30‬‬

‫میری رنگت کی وجہ سے کوئ مجھ سے بات نہیں کرنا‬ ‫‪31‬‬

‫چاہتا۔‬

‫لوگ میرے جسم کی وجہ سے مجھے نظر انداز کرتے‬ ‫‪32‬‬

‫ہیں۔‬

‫مجھے دوسروں کے مقابلے میں اپنا جسم بھدا محسوس‬ ‫‪33‬‬

‫ہوتا ہے۔‬

‫میں سرجری کے ذریعے اپنے خدوخال بہتر بنانا چاہتا ‪/‬‬ ‫‪34‬‬

‫چاہتی ہوں‬

‫مجھے اپنےموٹاپے کی وجہ سے شرمندگی محسوس‬ ‫‪35‬‬

‫ہوتی ہے۔‬

‫‪13‬‬
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