Extremely good body image can affect women's health: Study

Updated on: 09 May,2009 01:35 PM IST |
Agencies |

Extremely good body image can affect women's health: Study

All women want to look good, slim and attractive, have perfect hair and clothes to die for. But, a new study says that an extremely good body image can be as damaging for a female as a poor self-image.
Researchers at Temple University have carried out the study and found that an extremely good body image can take its toll on a woman's health just like a poor self-image may lead to a host of both mental and physical health problems.
They have based their findings on an analysis of the body image perceptions of a group of 81 underweight, normal weight, overweight or obese women in North Philadelphia.
In fact, in the study, all participants were measured for height, weight, and completed a questionnaire to determine their self-perceived, current and ideal body sizes. Each woman was then shown an illustration of different-sized women that correlated with increasing BMIs, and were asked which size they felt they're at currently and what their ideal would be.
They found that as the subjects' body mass index increased, two-thirds of the women still felt they're at an ideal body size.
While most of the participants selected illustrations of women in the normal to overweight range, about 20 per cent of the obese women selected an overweight or obese silhouette as their ideal body shape to be specific.
Further, 68 per cent of overweight participants and 84 percent of obese women underestimated their current BMI, the study revealed.