Graduation Year

2018

Date of Submission

4-2018

Document Type

Campus Only Senior Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelor of Arts

Department

Psychology

Reader 1

Stacey N. Doan

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Rights Information

©Yutong Zhou

Abstract

The proposed study aims to investigate the effects of culture and mass media images of female bodies in an active or static pose on mood, body idealization, and body dissatisfaction. Participants included female students with Chinese heritage culture (age M =21.26, SD =2.5) and 130 female students who identified with American heritage culture (age M =20.82, SD =1.2). Participants filled out an online survey distributed through Qualtrics, which includes a pre-and-post negative affect and body satisfaction measure. They were randomly assigned to one of three conditions, viewing posing models, models in active poses, or scenery images. Consistent with previous findings, the current study results showed a main effect of body conceptualization on participants’ body dissatisfaction and choice of ideal body image. Viewing pictures of models either in static or active poses led to significant increase in body dissatisfaction and increased the likelihood of choosing skinnier ideal body image as compared to the control condition. However, there was no main effect of culture and interaction between culture and body conceptualization. Future research is needed to explore other variables that might moderate the association between body conceptualization and participants’ psychological outcomes after exposing to body ideals in mass media presentations.

This thesis is restricted to the Claremont Colleges current faculty, students, and staff.

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