Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Commons^™

How Cultural Orientation And Self-Compassion Shape Objectified Body Consciousness For Women From America, Belgium, Russia, And Thailand, Robin Wollast, Abigail R. Riemer, Sarah Gervais, Lusine Grigoryan, Philippe Bernard, Olivier Klein

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

According to objectification theory, being treated as an object leads women to engage in self-objectification, which in turn increases body surveillance and body shame, impairing women’s mental health. While most studies focusing on self-objectification rely heavily on Western populations that emphasize individualism, the current work investigates the phenomenon of body surveillance and body shame in a cross-cultural framework, involving a comparison between American, Belgian, Russian, and Thai women (N = 605). This study aims to highlight two predictors – cultural orientation and self-compassion. Results indicate that greater endorsement of vertical individualism is related to body surveillance for American, Belgian, …