خوددلسوزی مقایسه بدن و ارتباط منفی ظاهر خودارزشی با خشنودی از بدن را تعدیل می کند

Abstract Although research on positive body image has increased, little research has explored which variables protect body appreciation during body-related threats. Self-compassion may be one such variable. Individuals high in self-compassion are mindful, kind, and nurturing toward themselves during situations that threaten their adequacy, while recognizing that being imperfect is part of “being human.” In this study, we investigated whether two body-related threats (i.e., body comparison and appearance contingent self-worth) were more weakly related to body appreciation when self-compassion was high among an online sample of 263 women (Mage = 35.26, SD = 12.42). Results indicated that self-compassion moderated the inverse relationships between body related threats and body appreciation. Specifically, when self-compassion was very high, body comparison and appearance contingent self-worth were unrelated to body appreciation. However, when self-compassion was low, these relationships were strong. Self-compassion, then, may help preserve women's body appreciation during body-related threats.

Introduction Within the past decade, scholars have acknowledged the value in understanding and promoting positive body image and thus have begun investigating this construct via qualitative and quantitative designs (Frisén and Holmqvist, 2010, Tylka, 2011 and Wood-Barcalow et al., 2010). The most comprehensive and studied aspect of positive body image is body appreciation, which is defined as holding favorable opinions toward the body regardless of its appearance, accepting the body along with its deviations from societal beauty ideals, respecting the body by attending to its needs and engaging in healthy behaviors, and protecting the body by rejecting unrealistic media appearance ideals (Avalos, Tylka, & Wood-Barcalow, 2005). This construct does not simply represent the “healthy” end of a continuum with body dissatisfaction anchoring the “unhealthy” end, but instead, has been shown to be uniquely related to various indicators of well-being (Avalos et al., 2005). Although body image researchers have extensively explored causes and correlates of body dissatisfaction, body appreciation has received less attention. However, because body appreciation entails more than the absence of dissatisfaction and has strong links to well-being, it is important to consider factors that help to achieve and sustain it. The present study explored the moderating role of self-compassion in the context of two potential challenges to body appreciation: social comparison and appearance contingent self-worth. Self-compassion is defined as an attitude of kindness and understanding toward one's personal disappointments and struggles that includes three interconnected components: mindfulness, self-kindness, and common humanity (Neff, 2003a and Neff, 2003b). Mindfulness refers to being open to and moved by personal distress while taking a nonjudgmental attitude toward perceived inadequacies and failures. Self-kindness entails treating oneself with understanding, patience, and forgiveness, even when confronted with perceived inadequacy or disappointment. People who are self-kind affirm that they deserve love and affection. Common humanity refers to the recognition that all people are imperfect, make mistakes, and experience failure. As a result of this recognition, self-compassionate people do not feel isolated by the experience of failure or struggle. Self-compassion is different conceptually from self-esteem; self-esteem distances people from confronting their personal inadequacies which preempts their experience of distress and prompts self-enhancing illusions (Neff, 2009 and Neff and Vonk, 2009). Substantial evidence supports self-compassion as a beneficial characteristic (Leary et al., 2007 and Neff et al., 2005). Self-compassionate people report lower rates of psychological distress, such as anxiety, depression, and stress (MacBeth & Gumley, 2012). They also report higher rates of desirable characteristics, such as life satisfaction, social connectedness, perceived competence, and intrinsic motivation (Neff, 2003b and Neff et al., 2005). Self-compassion is also related to healthier body image, including lower body dissatisfaction, body shame, and body surveillance as well as higher body appreciation and body image flexibility (i.e., the ability to accept negative body-related thoughts and feelings while remaining committed to desired and valued behaviors; Daye et al., 2014, Kelly et al., 2014, Mosewich et al., 2011 and Wasylkiw et al., 2012). Researchers have begun to replicate these findings using experimental designs; for example, community women who received a 3-week online self-compassion meditation training program experienced greater body appreciation and lower body shame and body dissatisfaction, and maintained these improvements at a 3-month follow-up, relative to a control group (Albertson, Neff, & Dill-Shackleford, 2014). Researchers are beginning to conceptualize self-compassion as a buffer, or moderator, of the relationships between distressing events and negative self-feelings (Leary et al., 2007). Moderators change the strength or direction of the relationship between two variables, asking “when or for whom” a given relationship exists (Karazsia, van Dulmen, Wong, & Crowther, 2013, p. 434). By definition, people high in self-compassion respond to situations that threaten their personal adequacy by treating themselves with kindness and nonjudgmental understanding (Neff, 2003a), and this process can help to regulate negative emotions (Leary et al., 2007). Indeed, experimental manipulations of self-compassion have been shown to increase positive affect and decrease negative feelings about the self, when compared to control groups without self-compassion inductions (Leary et al., 2007). For example, among college women who restrict their eating, those who were induced to think self-compassionately after eating a doughnut (i.e., they were told that all people eat unhealthy foods at times and asked to not to be hard on themselves because “this little amount of food doesn’t matter anyway”) were able to reduce their disinhibited eating relative to a control group who did not receive the self-compassion induction (Adams & Leary, 2007, p. 1129). Because self-compassion has been shown to regulate negative emotions, it is likely that it can buffer women against factors that produce feelings of shame toward their bodies, and initial evidence supports this idea. For example, given that society defines beauty as being thin for women, elevated BMI is often linked to weight stigma (interpersonal shame by others) and internalized self-shame among women (Tylka et al., 2014). A recent study showed that self-compassion weakened the positive relationship between BMI and eating pathology and inverse relationship between BMI and body image flexibility for women (Kelly et al., 2014). The authors concluded that treating oneself with understanding and kindness served as a protective factor for women, offsetting stigma and shame associated with having an elevated BMI in a culture that values thinness. Another recent study found that self-compassion weakened the links between women's restrictive/critical caregiver eating messages (i.e., memories of their caregivers reprimanding them for eating too much and insinuating that they may be or become fat) and both body surveillance and body shame (Daye et al., 2014). These authors also concluded that self-compassion can protect women, in this case from early experiences of shame related to their bodies. Another variable that has been shown to contribute to women's feelings of inferiority is social comparison, which is the process of using information about others to derive conclusions about the self (Festinger, 1954). People engage in social comparison in domains that personally matter—and women are heavily socialized to view appearance as such a domain (Buote, Wilson, Strahan, Gazzola, & Papps, 2011). Indeed, evidence confirms that women commonly compare their bodies to their peers (Leahey et al., 2007 and Trottier et al., 2007). It has been well-documented via correlational and experimental research that making frequent appearance comparisons is related to more negative feelings and derogatory statements about the body (Bamford and Halliwell, 2009, Corning and Gondoli, 2012, Groesz et al., 2002 and Myers and Crowther, 2009). These findings are often explained in terms of “upward comparisons.” That is, when women compare themselves to someone who is thinner in cultures that value thinness, the recognition that they are heavier is likely to produce feelings of lowliness and negative self-appraisal (Major, Testa, & Bylsma, 1991). However, it is plausible that self-compassion could mitigate these well-documented effects. For example, if a woman recognizes that she is not as thin or toned as a peer or a health/fashion model, a compassionate attitude would help her to regulate feelings of inferiority and avoid self-criticism. A compassionate attitude might help her to assuage body-related distress that could emerge from the perceived discrepancy by recognizing that all bodies are different and nearly all bodies fall short of cultural ideals. A second variable that has been associated with women's distress is appearance contingent self-worth. Given pervasive cultural messages about the importance of physical beauty (particularly thinness), it is not surprising that many women internalize this message and come to believe that their worth as a person is, at least in part, rooted in their appearance (Buote et al., 2011). People seek to attain success and avoid failure in domains that matter most to them, and when self-worth is contingent upon an external criterion such as physical appearance, appearance takes on heightened importance (Crocker, Sommers, & Luhtanen, 2002). When women invest their self-worth in appearing like an unrealistic and unattainable criterion (e.g., digitally modified media images of women), then they may experience body-related distress. Consistent with this idea, appearance contingent self-worth has been linked with higher concerns about weight or shape (Grossbard, Lee, Neighbors, & Larimer, 2009) and higher body dissatisfaction, body surveillance, and eating disturbance (Bailey and Ricciardelli, 2010 and Overstreet and Quinn, 2012). Yet, self-compassion may be able to weaken these associations. Self-compassion is not based on outperforming others or congruence with external standards. Instead, it is based on accepting oneself and recognizing that shortcomings or imperfections are part of being human. Thus, it is plausible that a self-compassionate attitude will promote self-kindness and understanding rather than self-judgment and criticism when women who value appearance fail to reach certain cultural standards of attractiveness. To date, no study has explored whether self-compassion moderates the relationships between body comparison or appearance contingent self-worth and body appreciation. Therefore, we tested four hypotheses, grounded in the literature and rationale presented above. First, we hypothesized that body comparison and appearance contingent self-worth would show inverse associations with body appreciation. Although it has been well-established that body comparison and appearance contingent self-worth are related to higher body dissatisfaction, it is unknown whether they are related to body appreciation, a distinct construct from low body dissatisfaction (Avalos et al., 2005). Second, consistent with previous research (Wasylkiw et al., 2012), we predicted that self-compassion would show a significant positive relationship with body appreciation. Our third and fourth hypotheses were that self-compassion would moderate by weakening the inverse relationships between (a) body comparison and body appreciation, and (b) appearance contingent self-worth and body appreciation.

Results Prior to analyses, data were carefully screened. The percentage of missing items was very low (M = 0.63%). Therefore, we performed available item analysis given that it performs as well as more complex methods (e.g., multiple imputation) when the number of missing items is low and measures are internally consistent within the sample ( Parent, 2013). Next, we examined the distributions of each of the major study variables for violations of normality. Skew and kurtosis for all variables were within recommended limits for regression analyses (that is, less than 3.00 for skew and less than 10.00 for kurtosis; Kline, 2010). Four univariate outliers were detected and these values were excluded from all analyses, and two multivariate outliers were detected via Mahalanobis distance and excluded from the regression analyses. Thus, the regression analyses were based on 257 cases. Finally, there were no significant mean differences between the MTurk participants and the college participants on social comparison, appearance self-worth, body appreciation, or self-compassion (all ps > .05); thus, these data were combined for the analyses. Means, standard deviations, and intercorrelations for the study variables are shown in Table 1. As hypothesized, body comparison and appearance self-worth were negatively correlated with body appreciation. Self-compassion was inversely associated with body comparison and appearance self-worth and positively associated with body appreciation. Given that BMI was associated with body appreciation, and age was associated with self-compassion and appearance contingent self-worth, we controlled for BMI and age in the regression analyses. Table 1. Means, standard deviations, and intercorrelations for major study variables. Variable M SD Range 1 2 3 4 5 1. Self-compassion 3.12 0.78 1–5 – 2. Body comparison 3.79 1.50 1–7 −.42*** – 3. Body appreciation 3.46 0.81 1–5 .62*** −.52*** – 4. Appearance self-worth 4.51 1.31 1–7 −.55*** .68*** −.56*** – 5. Body mass index 26.23 6.45 15.84–49.87 −.07 .07 −.37*** .02 – 6. Age 35.26 12.42 19–76 .13* −.10 .03 −.16* .14* Note. N = 263 (except BMI where N = 259). * p < .05. *** p < .001. Table options In order to test self-compassion as a moderator, we performed two regression-based moderation analyses. In Model 1, the predictor was body comparison, and in Model 2, the predictor was appearance self-worth. For both analyses, the moderator was self-compassion and the criterion variable was body appreciation. The interaction term was formed by multiplying the predictor by self-compassion. For both models, BMI and age were entered at Step 1 as covariates, the predictor and self-compassion were entered at Step 2, and their interaction was entered at Step 3. All variables were mean-centered. Results are summarized in Table 2. Table 2. Summary of regression results predicting body appreciation with self-compassion as a moderator. ΔR2 B SE 95% CI t p Model 1 Predictors (Step 3) Age −.002 .003 −.007, −.004 −0.53 .594 BMI −.039 .005 −.049, −.028 −7.28 <.001 Body comparison −.166 .025 −.215, −.116 −6.56 <.001 Self-compassion .467 .050 .369, .565 9.38 <.001 Body comparison × Self-compassion .009 .067 .029 .009, .124 2.29 .023 Model 2 Predictors (Step 3) Age −.002 .003 −.008, .003 −0.87 .383 BMI −.041 .005 −.051, −.031 −7.80 <.001 Appearance self-worth −.217 .032 −.279, −.154 −6.81 <.001 Self-compassion .410 .054 .303, .516 7.58 <.001 Appearance self-worth × Self-compassion .014 .091 .032 .022, .155 2.83 .005 Note. N = 257. For Model 1, total R2 at Step 3 = .56, p < .001. For Model 2, total R2 at Step 3 = .57, p < .001. Table options For the first moderation analysis, self-compassion showed a significant positive relationship with body appreciation, B = .37 (95% CI = .30, .45), SE = .04, t(252) = 9.47, p < .001, and body comparison showed a significant negative relationship with body appreciation, B = −.25 (95% CI = −.32, −.17), SE = .04, t(252) = −6.53, p < .001. However, this latter association was conditional upon self-compassion, as evidenced by the significant coefficient for the interaction term in Step 3. In order to probe this conditional association, we tested the significance of the simple slopes and created a plot of the regression lines for body comparison predicting body appreciation at two levels of self-compassion (plus and minus one standard deviation from the mean). This plot is presented in Fig. 1. At low levels of self-compassion, body comparison was strongly related to poorer body appreciation, B = −.22 (95% CI = −.29, −.15), SE = .03, t(252) = −6.47, p < .001. However, at high levels of self-compassion, body comparison was more weakly associated with body appreciation, B = −.11 (95% CI = −.18, −.05), SE = .03, t(252) = −3.39, p < .001. Another way to probe a significant interaction is the Johnson-Neyman technique ( Johnson and Neyman, 1936 and Preacher et al., 2006). This procedure determines the value of the moderator at which the predictor no longer has a significant relationship with the criterion. For this analysis, body comparison was no longer related to body appreciation when self-compassion was 4.27 (on a 1–5 scale) or greater, B = −.09 (95% CI = −.17, .00), SE = .04, t(252) = −1.96, p = .050. Regression lines showing the relationships between body comparison and body ... Fig. 1. Regression lines showing the relationships between body comparison and body appreciation by low (−1 SD) and high (1 SD) levels of self-compassion, as well as when this relationship is no longer significant using the Johnson-Neyman (JN) technique. Figure options A similar analysis was conducted for appearance self-worth, and the same pattern of results emerged. In Step 2, self-compassion significantly predicted body appreciation, B = .33 (95% CI = .24, .41), SE = .04, t(252) = 7.71, p < .001, and higher appearance self-worth significantly predicted lower body appreciation, B = −.27 (95%CI = −.35, −.19), SE = .04, t(252) = −6.42, p < .001. Again, this latter relationship was conditional upon self-compassion, as can be seen by the significant interaction term in Step 3. Fig. 2 illustrates this conditional association. At low levels of self-compassion (that is, one standard deviation below the mean), appearance self-worth was strongly related to lower body appreciation, B = −.29 (95% CI = −0.37, −0.20), SE = .04, t(252) = −6.71, p < .001. However, at high levels of self-compassion (one standard deviation above the mean), appearance self-worth showed a weaker relationship with body appreciation, B = −.14 (95% CI = −0.22, −0.07), SE = .05, t(252) = −3.90, p < .001. The Johnson-Neyman technique indicated that appearance self-worth had no significant relationship with body appreciation when self-compassion was equal to or exceeded 4.29, B = −.10 (95% CI = −.19, .00), SE = .05, t(252) = −1.96, p = .050. Regression lines showing the relationships between appearance contingent ... Fig. 2. Regression lines showing the relationships between appearance contingent self-worth and body appreciation by low (−1 SD) and high (1 SD) levels of self-compassion, as well as when this relationship is no longer significant using the Johnson-Neyman (JN) technique.