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Social Stigma of Obesity

In the media:

Media, in general, overrepresents underweight individuals and underrepresents overweight individuals. One third of women in television are classified as underweight, while only 5% of the general population falls into that category. Conversely, a study on over a thousand major television characters from 2003 identified 14% of female characters and 24% of male characters to be overweight, despite the real-world percentages being more than double those reported numbers.

Even when overweight people are included in television, they often play minor, stereotyped roles. Nearly two thirds of the most popular children’s movies contain negative portrayals of fat people, stereotyping them to be unintelligent, lazy, and evil. Fat television characters are more commonly seen eating, and are less likely to be involved in a romantic relationships compared to average weight television characters. Male characters are also less commonly seen with close friendships.

In 2007, another analysis sampled 135 scenes featuring overweight individuals from popular television programs and movies and coded for anti-fat humor. The majority of anti-fat humor found was verbal and directed at the individual in their presence. Additionally, a relationship was found between audience laughter and a male character poking fun at a female character’s body, but that same relationship wasn’t there when it was a female character ridiculing a fat male.

The media is often blamed for the strong negative trait associations that society has toward overweight individuals. There is a great deal of empirical research to support the idea of Thin Ideal media, or the idea that the media tends to glorify and focus on thin actors and actresses, models, and other public figures while avoiding the use of overweight individuals.

Puhl et al. (2009) also reviewed how media is a particularly potent source of weight stigma in news reporting and advertising. News reports have blamed individuals with overweight and obesity for various societal issues including prices of fuel, global temperature trends, and precipitating weight gain among their peers. The news media repeatedly engages in the “Headless Fatties” phenomenon, coined by Charlotte Cooper, in which images and videos only depict overweight individuals as bodies by cropping out their heads. This objectification happens in 72% of all news reports on obesity and weight loss.

The University of California, Los Angeles, conducted a study that analyzed scientific research on weight and the news reports on such research. They looked for disparities in language, the cited causes of obesity, and proposed solutions. News stories were more likely than the scientific articles to dramatized language, words such as epidemic, crisis, war, and terrorism, and were more likely to cite individual behaviors as the causes and solutions to obesity, ignoring the systemic issues.

In Education

In regards to more direct weight bias, obese individuals were 40-50% more likely to report a perception of major discrimination compared to those of average weight across a multitude of settings. In the educational setting, those who are overweight as youth often face peer rejection and are bullied more Overweight children have poorer school performance if they experience weight-based teasing. Between fifth and eighth grade, a child’s increase in BMI results in a decrease in their teacher’s perception of that student’s ability, and 50% of principals believe fatness is just a result of lacking self control. Research suggests that within the classroom teachers may perceive overweight individuals’ work more poorly compared to average weight individuals, and the attention the teacher provides to these two groups may differ. Research has also found that overweight females receive less financial support for education from their families than average weight females, after controlling for ethnicity, family size, income, and education. As individuals grow older they may be less likely to be admitted into a college compared to average weight persons, and in some cases, individuals were admitted to academic institutions and dismissed due to weight.

Puhl and colleagues (2009) concluded from their review of weight stigma in education that current trends indicate students with overweight and obesity face barriers to educational success at every level of education. Reviewed research demonstrates that educators, particularly Physical Education teachers, report antifat attitudes toward their students with overweight and obesity, which may undermine educational achievement. Importantly, the education disparities for students with overweight and obesity appear to be strongest for students attending schools where obesity is not the norm. Several studies have evidenced that in environments such as these, students with overweight and obesity face greater educational disadvantages and are less likely to attend college, an effect that is particularly strong among women. Moreover, weight stigma in educational settings also affects interpersonal relationships (see "Interpersonal situations" below).