Body Shaming, Social Appearance Anxiety and Mental Health in Young Adults

Abstract

The current study used a correlational research design to investigate a relationship between body shaming, social appearance anxiety and mental health in young adults. It was hypothesized that there would be an association between body shaming, social appearance anxiety and mental health in young adults. The 400 undergraduates (N=400) in the sample ranged in age from 19 to 25 years (M= 21.54 SD= 2.58) old of them, including males (n=200) and Females (n=200). A convenient sampling approach was employed to gather data from several government and private universities. The approach to participation and data collection employed a convenient sampling. The degree of body shaming, social appearance anxiety, and mental health were assessed using the Social Appearance Anxiety Scale (SAAS: Hart, Wearing, & Newlove, 1999), Body Objectified Consciousness Scale (OBCS: Mckinley & Hyde‚ 1996), and Depression Anxiety Stress Scale (DASS: Lovibond, 1995). It were revealed that body shaming had positive correlated with social appearance anxiety and mental health. Moreover body shaming and social appearance anxiety are likely to predict mental health.