Thin Is Not ‘In’ For Everyone.

The message to white women in this country is to be as thin as possible, but the same standard is not applied by black men and women. A new study by social psychologists shows that whites, men and women alike, are more obsessed with thinness than blacks, who think medium-sized individuals of either gender are certainly as attractive as those who are thin.

For the 130 million Americans who are heavy or obese, the risk of serious health problems is well established. So too is the fact that society often brands over-weight individuals as lazy, undisciplined and unhappy. While the stigma of obesity is stronger among women, new research by university psychologists shows that men also stigmatize heavy men and women, although black men show greater latitude in what they find acceptable.

“Black men don’t seem to have the same craze for thinness as white men do,” says Rice University psychologist Mikki Hebl.

“White men and women believe ‘the thinner the better,’ but black men and women see no significant difference between thin and medium-sized men and women.”

While a number of factors may explain the disparity in standards of beauty between whites and blacks, Hebl believes both viewpoints have important implications.

“On the one hand, blacks’ lack of stigmatization against obesity has some negative health implications as there are strong associations between obesity and medical problems,” Hebl says.

“On the other hand, blacks’ ability to see body shapes other than ultra-thin as attractive may be strongly connected to the fact that they have more positive body images and are less likely to diet and have eating disorders to the degree white women do.”

In an article titled “The Stigma of Obesity: What About Men?” published in the journal Basic and Applied Social Psychology, Hebl and Julie M. Turchin from Stanford University examine whether black and white men are stigmatized for being obese and whether they stigmatize others who are obese. By analyzing how black and white men perceive thin, medium and large-sized black and white men and women, the researchers find that men, not just women, stigmatize obesity. They also offer additional evidence that blacks and whites do evaluate weight differently.

These and other findings were based on the responses of 68 black and white undergraduate male students at Northeastern University in Boston. The subjects were each asked to view 12 target photographs randomly selected from a set of 48 photographs of men and an equal number containing women. All of the photographs were collected from magazines and casual photographs of black and white men and women who had thin, medium or heavy physiques, were professionally dressed and had positive expressions on their faces.

The undergraduate male subjects were asked to assess the individuals pictured in terms of their intelligence, attractiveness, how well they performed their jobs, how happy and popular they appeared, and how likely it was that they held professional positions. The participants also were asked to rate the weight of each individual on a scale from “very thin” to “very obese.”

“Our results showed that, in our sample, white men were stigmatized in much the same way as white women,” says Hebl. ” Thin white men were viewed more positively than medium white men, while medium weight men were viewed more positively than were large white men.”

A slightly different pattern was discovered for black men. Although the heavier men or women appeared, the more negatively they were viewed by black men, images of thin black men were not rated much differently than black men with medium builds. The results showed that black men perceived black women similarly in terms in their size. They stigmatized large black women, but not thin or medium women, and overall, they did not differentiate between thin or medium sizes.

“This study debunks the myth that black men prefer heavier women,” Hebl says.

“Instead, we found black men view both thin and medium size women similarly and more desirably than heavy women, while white men clearly view thin women most favorably and medium and large women less so.”

Generally, white men rated white women who appeared medium or heavy more negatively in terms of their attractiveness, how happy and successful they were in their relationships, and the likelihood they held a professional job. They did not stigmatize them based on their size when rating their intelligence or how well they performed their job.

Black men viewed heavy black women as less attractive and less popular than thin or medium-weight women, but only slightly less happy and successful.

Hebl believes future research that looks into different standards of beauty among subcultures can provide valuable insights into why certain individuals accept greater size and are generally less concerned with weight and body image than others.

An applied social psychologist, Hebl has conducted extensive research into the social psychology of stigma, particularly regarding obesity. Her work is widely published in several scholarly journals, including Personality and Social Psychological Review and the Journal of Applied Social Psychology.

A member of Rice’s psychology faculty since 1998, Hebl received her undergraduate degree in psychology from Smith College, her master’s from Texas A & M University and her Ph.D. degree from Dartmouth College.

For more information at http://www.rice.edu