Thin or Overweight Women's Fat Talk: Which Is Worse for Other Women's Body Satisfaction?

Abstract

Fat talk is not merely correlated with, but appears to be one of the causes of body dissatisfaction in other women. Moderators of fat talk's deleterious effects, however, have not yet been identified. This experiment tested whether the body type of the fat-talker affects listeners’ body satisfaction. Women viewed photos of either noticeably thin or overweight women making either fat talk or positive body statements. Fat talk by thin and overweight women both had a negative impact on women's body satisfaction, but dissatisfaction was highest after exposure to photos of thin women making fat talk statements. Statistically indistinguishable from this latter effect, however, was the negative effect of thin women making positive body statements. Results are considered within a social comparison framework. Theoretical implications for the thin-ideal and fat talk literatures are presented, as are clinical implications for work with clients.