خیره شدن به آینه جذابیت در زنان راضی، نه در زنان ناراضی را افزایش می دهد: مدل برای اختلال بدریخت انگاری بدن؟

Body dysmorphic disorder is a severe disturbance in which the person is preoccupied with an imagined defect in appearance. It is unclear what causes and what maintains BDD, although it is assumed that patients are characterized by an increased self-focused attention. Since patients spend a lot of time examining their ‘defect’ in reflecting surfaces, it might well be that mirror gazing itself is an important maintaining factor for BDD, as it may lead to a loss of sense of proportions. If so, normal individuals' body evaluations are expected to decrease likewise after mirror exposure. In the present study, 50 female students watched both their own face in the mirror and a photograph of a neutral female face for 3.5 min. Before and after gazing, they rated the attractiveness of the faces. Results indicate that mirror exposure did not lead to decreased attractiveness in normal participants. However, when participants were divided into high and low satisfaction about appearance, highly satisfied individuals' evaluations of their own face improved, whereas low satisfied individuals' evaluations tended to decrease. For the other face, only the low satisfied individuals showed increased attractiveness scores at post-test. The results are explained by selective visual attention and are in line with recent findings in eating disordered women.

Body dysmorphic disorder (BDD) can be a chronic, debilitating condition in which the person is preoccupied with an imagined defect in one's appearance or, in the case of a slight physical anomaly, the person's concern is markedly excessive (American Psychiatric Association, 2000). The concerns often relate to one or more body parts that are visible to other people, such as the nose, ears, skin and eyes. However, the preoccupations might also concern the more covered body parts such as the muscles or genitals (Albertini & Phillips, 1999). Reliable data on the prevalence of BDD are still lacking, but it seems to affect men and women equally and it usually develops around adolescence (Phillips, Kim, & Hudson, 1995). BDD patients spend a lot of time – about 3–8 h per day (Phillips, 1996) – thinking about their defect, examining it in mirrors or other reflecting surfaces, and trying to hide, camouflage or even change the so-called deformity (Veale, 2000 and Veale and Riley, 2001). The disorder is, thus, time consuming and chronic, although the level of functioning may vary across individuals: some people function reasonably well while others are isolated, develop a (secondary) depression or even commit suicide (Cororve & Gleaves, 2001).