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Weight- Based Discrimination in Occupational
Hiring and Helping Behavior
Viren Swami and Others
University of Westminster
PSY 24700: Social Psychology
Professor Berlus
April 18, 2022
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The article that I have chosen to summarize, Weight-Based Discrimination in
occupational Hiring and Helping Behavior by Viren Swami and others, studies and compares the
stigmatization of women across a range of body weights in the sense of two separate scenarios:
the first one being an occupational hiring, and the second one being a helping behavior. Swami
discussed the likelihood of women with a higher body mass index (BMI) of > 30 to not be hired
or helped in comparison to women with an average BMI of 19-20.
Primarily, research has shown that obesity stigmatization has become increasingly
widespread since the early 1980’s to a point where many began to believe that obesity
stigmatization has become another form of discrimination (Swami, 2008). As a result,
individuals experiencing such suffer from psychological and social consequences especially
within the workplace. According to Swami, it is more likely that an overweight and obese
individual to be exposed to prejudice and inequity even before the interview process begins
(2008). Multiple studies conducted throughout the years have shown that average weight
individuals were prone to be hired for a position as well as associated with positive behaviors,
whereas overweight individuals were less prone to receive a position as well as associated with
negative and undesirable behaviors.
Earlier studies of weight- based discrimination prior to Swami’s study mainly examined
the discrimination against overweight and obese individuals. However, Swami believed that the
study could have an even more confident conclusion if they also researched and studied the
discrimination against emaciated and underweight individuals (Swami, 2008).
The purpose of this experiment is to show that individuals who are emaciated (BMI<15)
are just as likely to suffer from discrimination as are obese and overweight individuals. It is also
important to study individuals within the emaciated and underweight groups due to the fact that
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they are also seen as inferior when it comes to physical attractiveness in comparison to normalweight and over-weight individuals (Swami, 2008). Swami decided to conduct two experiments
to test his study in which he brings male individuals who would vote for women from a range of
weight categories based on their likeliness to hire them for a position as well as their likeliness to
help them after a serious accident.
During the first study, there were 30 British male undergraduate participants present with
an average mean age of 24.9 years and a self -reported BMI mean on 23.51. They were first
shown grayscale images of 50 women wearing gray leotards and leggings. To prevent any
influenced judgments the heads of these women were cut from the images, so their judgments
aren’t affected by facial attractiveness. Of these 50 women 10 of them belonged to each of the
five BMI categories: emaciated (BMI < 15), underweight (BMI of 15- 18.5), normal (BMI of
18.5- 24.9), overweight (BMI of 25.0- 29.9), and obese (BMI >30). They were given their
booklets in which they recorded their ratings. After doing so they moved onto part two of the
experiment.
In part two of the first experiment, the participants were told that they are now going to
examine the images again and on a 9- point scale with 1 being very unlikely and 9 being very
likely, they are going to rate their likeliness to hire each female for a job in sales management.
(Swami, 2008). Prior to doing so they were told to assume that all of the applicants are equally
qualified and have the same amount of experience. To help model this data Swami used multiple
regression model. “This approach balances the amount of variance accounted for with the
simplest possible regression model” (Swami, 2008, p.973).
The results of this study showed participants are more likely to hire an applicant who
have a BMI of 19.26. After calculating the mean rating of each weight category, the normal-
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weight and underweight category were rated the highest with a mean of 5.46-5.93, following
them was emaciated and overweight category with a mean of 4.13- 4.24, and lastly the obese
category with a mean of 2.00. This as a result helped conclude that individuals who have slender
body weight are more likely to be hired in comparison to emaciated, overweight, and obese
individuals.
During the second experiment, there were 28 British male undergraduate participants
present with an average mean age of 20.9 years and a self -reported BMI mean on 23.08. They
were shown images of women identical to those used in study 1, and given the scenario that they
just witnessed a serious accident that involved a pedestrian in which they are the only witness,
and they must provide a rating on a 9-point scale with 1 being very unlikely and 9 being very
likely of their likelihood in interfering and helping the pedestrian involved solely based on their
images and BMI.
The results of this study showed that the underweight category was rated the highest with
a mean of 6.05 but was very close to the rating of the normal-weight category with their mean
being 5.93. Following came the overweight category which was rated significantly higher than
the emaciated (M= 4.61) and obese (M=4.17) category with a mean of 5.30. This helped
conclude that victims who fall within the underweight and normal-weight category are most
likely to be helped in such scenarios while obese participants were least likely to be helped.
Based on both studies we are able to conclude that overweight and obese individuals are
less likely to be helped when hiring for a position and when being involved in an accident, and
this is because these groups are highly negatively stigmatized. In addition, new studies by Swami
have shown that emaciated individuals are also likely to be stigmatized against to some degree
because of the stereotype that whatever is beautiful is good.
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Reference:
Swami, V., Chan, F., Wong, V., Furnham, A., & Tovée, M. J. (2008). Weight-based
discrimination in occupational hiring and helping behavior. Journal of Applied Social
Psychology, 38(4), 968–981. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1559-1816.2008.00334.x