“Mom, quit fat talking—I'm trying to eat (mindfully) here!”: Evaluating a sociocultural model of family fat talk, positive body image, and mindful eating in college women

Abstract

A growing evidence base confirms sociocultural theory's predictions regarding the influence of direct exposure to family factors (e.g., parental commentary) in promoting disordered eating behavior as mediated by negative body image. Nevertheless, this model has not been specifically applied to investigating indirect or vicarious exposure to family communications (e.g., negative body talk) in estimating mindful eating behavior via positive body image intervening variables. Therefore, to address this gap the present study provided a preliminary evaluation of the indirect effects of overhearing family fat talk through both body appreciation and functional body appreciation in predicting mindful eating among undergraduate females. Participants included 333 women attending a large southeastern public university who completed measures of mindful eating, family fat talk, body appreciation, and functional body appreciation via an online survey platform. Results indicated that family fat talk was inversely associated with mindful eating, body appreciation, and functional body appreciation. Whereas engaging in mindful eating positively corresponded with both positive body image indices. A regression model controlling for BMI also revealed that an orientation towards appreciating what the body can do (and not a general appreciation of the body) helped explain the inverse association between family fat talk and mindful eating. Our initial findings tentatively suggest that focusing on the self-objectifying and self-denigrating body-related commentary of family members may disrupt attention to one's own appreciation of the (internal) workings of the body thereby undermining the mindful eating process. Implications for further expanding the translation of sociocultural theory in the context of positive body image and mindful eating are considered.