Dr. Devendra Singh
• At University of Texas
– Buss, Langlois, etc.
• Psychologist
– Food and alcohol addiction
• Body image and dieting-related research led
into his early waist-to-hip ratio studies
Body Image as Psychological
Construct
• Multidimensional self-attitudes toward
one’s body, particularly its appearance
• Self-perceptions, cognitions, affect, and
behaviours
• Has moderate relationship with self-esteem
and psychosocial adjustment issues
– e.g., eating disturbances, depression, social
anxiety, sexual frustration
Psychology Today (1972 & 1985)
• Popular magazine
– Mail-in survey
– Stratified random sample
• Found that women possess more negative bodyimage attitudes than men
– Shape and weight
– Fears of becoming fat
– Occur across lifespan, but especially prevalent in
adolescence
Cash & Henry (1995)
•
•
•
•
803 women
18-70 years
19 cities in 5 U.S.A. geographic regions
Representative cross-section of age, race,
income, education
• Door-to-door; left questionnaire booklet to
be collected next day; monetary
compensation
Subscales of the MB SRQ
• Appearance Evaluation (AE)
– 7 items to assess global evaluation of appearance
• Body Areas Satisfaction Scale (BASS)
– Height, weight, hair, face, upper-, mid-, and lower-torso
• Overweight Preoccupation (OP)
– Weight vigilance, fat anxiety, current dieting, eating restraint
Results
• Sizable minority of women report an overall
negative body image
• 36% report wholesale body dissatisfaction
on BASS
• 48% report unfavourable view of their body
on AE
• 49% report concerns about being
overweight
BASS Breakdown
Physical Area
Face
Height
Hair
Upper-torso
Muscle tone
Weight
Lower-torso
Mid-torso
% Dissatisfied % Dissatisfied/Neutral
11.7
30.4
13.4
30.2
16.3
28.0
25.1
47.3
36.9
63.9
46.0
63.3
47.4
64.2
51.0
69.8
Effect of Age and Race
• Age-cohort differences significant on AE
scale, but not BASS or OP
• 18-24 years have more favourable body
image than the four older groups (25-34, 3544, 45-54, 55-70)
• Black women had more favourable body
image than Anglo and Hispanic women
Disturbing Trend
• Nearly 50% of the women surveyed
reported globally negative evaluations of
looks and concerns about becoming
overweight
• Over 33% expressed body-image discontent
• Much worse than the 1985 survey
– 30% --> 48% unfavourable MB SRQ score
Cash, Ancis, & Strachan (1997)
• Learning?
• Cultural forces influence body image
• Jackson (1992)
– Across lifespan, women have poorer body
image than men
• Gender attitudes
• Ideologies
Cultural Norms
• Argued that cultural norms and expectations
encourage women & girls to focus attention
on their physical appearance
– Femininity ideals
• Role of values, attitudes, gender identities?
• Do nontraditional gender attitudes lead to
more positive body image?
“Types”
• Traditional (T)
• Feminist identity (F)
• Hypotheses
– T associated with greater body-image
investment
– T has more negative body-image evaluations
and affect
Study
• 122 female undergraduate
students
• Questionnaire
• Gender Attitude Inventory
(GAI)
– Gender stereotypes
– Sexual relationships
– Societal organizations
• Male-Female Relations
Questionnaire (MFRQ)
– Social interaction with men
– Male preference
• Feminist Identity
Development Scale
(FIDS)
– Five stages of feminist
development
• Multidimensional BodySelf Relations
Questionnaire (MB SRQ)
Results
• Did not support idea that development of
feminist identity or endorsement of
egalitarian social identity --> more positive
body image
• Also, traditional identity is not responsible
for controlling body image issues
Waist-to-Hip Ratio
• Not developed by Singh
• Measure going back into early-mid 20th century
for medical purposes
• Reflects distribution of fat between upper and
lower body and relative amount of intra- vs. extraabdominal fat
• Measure waist at narrowest point b/t ribs and iliac
crest and hip at greatest protrusion of buttocks
circumferences
Cutting to the Chase
• Basically, Singh’s early work supported a:
• Male preference for women with WHRs
around 0.7
• Female recognition of male preference
WHR
at
the
Oscars
(a few
years
back)
0.74
0.70
0.68
0.71
Amazon overcoming a Greek
(c. 350 BC)
Venus (Capitoline type)
(Rome copy of Greek, c. 360 BC)
Aphrodite bathing
(Roman, c. 150 AD)
The Three Graces
(by Antonio Canova, 1815-17)
Female/Male Differences
• Differences in post-puberty fat deposition
patterns
• Females: add fat to gluteofemoral region
• Males: lose fat from gluteofemoral region
and add to central abdomen and upper body
(shoulders, neck)
WHR Issues
•
•
•
•
Age
Health
Reproductive fitness, fecundity
All factor into potential adaptation for mate
selection
Sex Hormonal Role
• Testosterone: stimulates fat deposits to
abdomen and inhibits deposits to
gluteofemoral regions
• Estrogens: inhibit fat deposits in abdomen
and maximally stimulate deposits to
gluteofemoral region (and other regions,
too)
Android and Gynoid
• Body shapes
• Healthy body weight
range
• Highly different from
children and elderly
• Altering sex hormones
alters fat distributions
and body shape
Image modified from Pioneer Plaques
http://www.nd.edu/~jmontgom/ti/GraphicArchive/
Scans/Original%20Files/Pictograph/PioneerPlaque.jpg
Males: High Testosterone
Charles Atlas
Leo Robert
Dave Draper
And… Really High Testosterone
Lee Haney
Dorian Yates El Shahat Mabrouk
Ronnie Coleman
Female: Low Estrogens, High
Testosterone
(Ms. Olympia 2003)
Children
• Pre-sex hormone
• Fat deposition fairly
similar between sexes
• Can be difficult to
distinguish by fat
deposit form
• Clear difference
between pre- and postpuberty shapes
http://www.tootsiesdancewear.com/members/
547048/uploaded/132C_4.jpg
Weight
• Anorexia to obesity: both interfere with body
shape judgments
http://www.humanillnesses.com/original/
images/hdc_0001_0002_0_img0094.jpg
Elderly
• Circulating sex hormones drop
• Females add fat deposits to abdomen
• Male muscle mass drops, reducing android
shape; fat depositions generally follow
earlier pattern
• Loss in sex differentiation based on fat
deposition
Health
• Variety of heritable issues linked to fat
deposition patterns
• Polycystic ovarian syndrome, advanced
cirrhosis, hypogonadism, Klinefelter
syndrome, etc.
• Obesity itself has numerous complications:
cardiac issues, diabetes, stroke,
hypertension, etc.
Reproductive Status
• Obviously, linked to issues of age
• Hormone levels (lutenizing hormone,
follicle-stimulating hormone, sex steroids)
• Stored energy levels; pregnancy and
childrearing is going to be expensive
• Concealed ovulation and current fecundity
status
WHR
Speculation:
Pregnant or
Plump?
(Remember this?)
Pregnancy
• Obvious WHR
effect
• Relatively early
indicator of
pregnancy
http://www.virtualmedicalcentre.com/uploads/VMC/
DiseaseImages/2487_pregnancy_ext_440.jpg
Singh (1993)
• Manipulated WHR to change perceived
attractiveness
• If WHR preference is adaptation, should see
fairly consistent outcomes
• Attractiveness, healthiness, reproductive
capacity
Earlier Work on Idealized Figure
• Women guess males prefer thin female
• Males actually prefer not very thin
• Studies utilized body size (thin vs. fat), not
shape (i.e., fat distribution)
• Singh’s work utilized both size and shape
Stimuli
• Underweight,
normal,
overweight
• 0.7 to 1.0 WHRs
Stimuli
Results: Young Subjects
Results
• Generally, similar male and female patterns in
rankings
• Used both WHR and body weight to rank
• Within weight category, subjects systematically
used WHR to infer all attributes
• Overall, higher ratings for normal weight than
under- or overweight figures, and for 0.7 WHR
across weight categories
Results: Older Subjects (30-86)
Results
• Again, general agreement between sexes
• Unlike younger men, older men didn’t rank
U7 as attractive, healthy, or reproductive
Youthfulness
• Lack of association between youthfulness
and reproductive capacity
• In particular, underweights ranked high for
youthfulness, but low for reproductive
capacity
To Young to Reproduce?
• Age estimates
– Underweights: 17-19
– Normals: 23-26
– Overweights: 31-33
• Not because underweights are being judged
pre-pubescent
• Body weight, more than WHR, used for age
estimates
Honest Signals
• Signals = traits
• Honest if signal correlates with/reliably
predicts something useful to receiver of
signal
• Difficult to fake
• Too much dishonest signaling will disrupt
the system
WHR as Signal
• Singh’s work shows males and females
attend to WHR
• Utilized for a number of determinations
• Health, attractiveness, and particular WHRs
closely linked
• Hamilton & Zuk (1982): sexual selection
for signals of good health
Uniquely Human
• Gluteofemoral fat deposits
• No sexual dimorphism for fat distribution
• Development no more than 5-6 mya, likely
much more recently
http://www.mccullagh.org/db9/10d17/vervet-monkey.jpg
http://blog.theavclub.tv/wpcontent/uploads/2007/05/chimpanzee.jpg
http://s.buzzfed.com/static/imagebuzz/terminal01/2009/4/
20/11/hairless-chimpanzee-10348-1240240236-2.jpg
Bipedalism and Brain Size
• Bipedal Australopithecines 4.2-3.9 mya
• Brain size increases ~2.7 mya
• Newborn ape’s brain about 200 cc, roughly
half that of an adult’s
• Newborn human’s brain about 450 cc,
roughly a third the size of an adult’s
• Brain of 675 cc would make human head
too large to birth
Ancestral Growth Patterns
• Ancestors left apelike growth when adult brain passed
about 770 cc
– Beyond this, brain would have to more than double from birth
– Beginning of helplessness in infants
• H. habilis, 800 cc brain; H. erectus, 900 cc brain
• Late H. erectus’ (post 800 k) tooth growth pattern like
modern humans (and Neanderthals)
• Puts birthing and childrearing issues becoming significant
somewhere around 1.7-1.0 mya
Fat Stores
• Storage fat
– Depends on nutritional status; subcutaneous deposits
– 8-10% total body weight, both males and females
• Essential fat
– Includes gender-specific fat, bone marrow, deep fat
stores, CNS
– 14% of female total body weight; only 2-4% in males
– Not utilized for short-term food shortage
– “Reproductive fat” for females
– Gluteofemoral fat stores primarily used in late
pregnancy and lactation
Reproductive Capability
• Gluteofemoral fat stores
• Energy for gestation and lactation
• Proper infant brain development requires
lipids and lactose
• Differential reproductive success
WHR
• Good indicator of general
health as well as
reproductive capacity
• Selection favoured males
who picked females with
stored “reproductive”
calories, not general
obesity
– Studies show difficulties in
conception with higher
WHRs
Venus of Dolni Vestonice
(29,000-25,000 BCE)
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Venus_of
_Dolni_Vestonice.png
Feedback
• Men favoured gynoid fat distribution
• These women’s reproductive success
increased the genes for the gynoid form in
the gene pool
• Sexy daughters and sons with fathers’
preference
• Reasonable argument for WHR as honest
signal