Perceiving Systems, Computer Vision

Weight bias and linguistic body representation in anorexia nervosa: Findings from the BodyTalk project

2021

Article

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Objective: This study provides a comprehensive assessment of own body representation and linguistic representation of bodies in general in women with typical and atypical anorexia nervosa (AN). Methods: In a series of desktop experiments, participants rated a set of adjectives according to their match with a series of computer generated bodies varying in body mass index, and generated prototypic body shapes for the same set of adjectives. We analysed how body mass index of the bodies was associated with positive or negative valence of the adjectives in the different groups. Further, body image and own body perception were assessed. Results: In a German‐Italian sample comprising 39 women with AN, 20 women with atypical AN and 40 age matched control participants, we observed effects indicative of weight stigmatization, but no significant differences between the groups. Generally, positive adjectives were associated with lean bodies, whereas negative adjectives were associated with obese bodies. Discussion: Our observations suggest that patients with both typical and atypical AN affectively and visually represent body descriptions not differently from healthy women. We conclude that overvaluation of low body weight and fear of weight gain cannot be explained by generally distorted perception or cognition, but require individual consideration.

Award: (Top Cited Article 2021-2022)
Author(s): Simone Claire Behrens and Paolo Meneguzzo and Angela Favaro and Martin Teufel and Eva‐Maria Skoda and Marion Lindner and Lukas Walder and Alejandra Quiros-Ramirez and Stephan Zipfel and Betty Mohler and Michael Black and Katrin E. Giel
Journal: European Eating Disorders Review
Volume: 29
Number (issue): 2
Pages: 204--215
Year: 2021
Month: March
Publisher: Wiley

Department(s): Perceiving Systems
Research Project(s): Body Perception
Bibtex Type: Article (article)
Paper Type: Journal

Award Paper: Top Cited Article 2021-2022
DOI: 10.1002/erv.2812
State: Published

Links: on-line
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BibTex

@article{BodyTalk:AN:2020,
  title = {Weight bias and linguistic body representation in anorexia nervosa: Findings from the BodyTalk project},
  author = {Behrens, Simone Claire and Meneguzzo, Paolo and Favaro, Angela and Teufel, Martin and Skoda, Eva‐Maria and Lindner, Marion and Walder, Lukas and Quiros-Ramirez, Alejandra and Zipfel, Stephan and Mohler, Betty and Black, Michael and Giel, Katrin E.},
  journal = {European Eating Disorders Review},
  volume = {29},
  number = {2},
  pages = {204--215},
  publisher = {Wiley},
  month = mar,
  year = {2021},
  doi = {10.1002/erv.2812},
  month_numeric = {3}
}