Body Image Disturbance and The Social Norms Approach: An Integrative Review of the Literature

Abstract

This article merges two existing literatures: the body image literature and the social norms literature. Body image disturbance, which is known to be related to the development of eating disorders, continues to be an important area of study, particularly among college women. Perceived norms are known to be related to the occurrence of a variety of behaviors and attitudes, including heavy drinking and body image disturbance. Not only do existing norms influence behavior, but misperceptions regarding actual norms, which occur for a variety of reasons, are known to predict behavior as well. Interventions aimed at correcting normative misperceptions and thereby reducing problematic behaviors have shown promising results. Because normative misperceptions regarding norms for attractive body image predict eating disordered behaviors, applying intervention strategies based on correcting perceptions of the norm may prove to be a fruitful endeavor.