Body Ideals in Young Samoan Men: A Comparison with Men in North America and Europe

Abstract

Recent studies have suggested the young American and European men would prefer a far more muscular body than they actually possess. We assessed whether Samoan men, living in a non-Western culture on remote islands in the South Pacific, would exhibit a similar disparity between body reality and body ideal. We measured the height, weight, and estimated body fat of 28 young Samoan men. We then presented them with 100 male images, representing 10 levels of body fat and 10 levels of muscularity. We asked them to choose the images best representing (1) their own body, (2) the body of an average Samoan man of their age, (3) the body that they ideally would like to have, and (4) the body that they thought women liked best. The Samoan men accurately perceived their own bodies and the bodies of average men in their culture, but they chose an ideal body and a “women’s preferred” body three to five kilograms leaner and eight to 11 kilograms more muscular than themselves— a pattern strikingly similar to that previously found in American and European men. The body image disparities of young Samoan men closely resemble those found in North America and Western Europe. It is not clear whether these disparities represent a sociobiological phenomenon common to men everywhere, or whether they may be attributable to unrealistic Western media images of ideal male bodies that have penetrated even remote islands of the South Pacific. To test these hypotheses, future investigations should seek men in cultural settings even more insulated from the West.