Body Gaze as a Marker of Sexual Objectification: A New Scale for Pervasive Gaze and Gaze Provocation Behaviors in Heterosexual Women and Men

Abstract

Body gaze behavior is assumed to be a key feature of sexual objectification. However, there are few self-report gaze measures available and none capturing behavior which seeks to invite body gaze from others. Across two studies, we used existing self-report instruments and measurement of eye movements to validate a new self-report scale to measure pervasive body gaze behavior and body gaze provocation behavior in heterosexual women and men. In Study 1, participants (N = 1021) completed a survey with newly created items related to pervasive body gaze and body gaze provocation behavior. Participants also completed preexisting measures of body attitudes, sexual assault attitudes, pornography use, and relationship status. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses across independent samples suggested a 12-item scale for men and women to separately measure pervasive body gaze (5 items) and body gaze provocation (7 items) toward the opposite sex. The two scales yielded excellent internal consistency estimates (.86–.89) and promising convergent validity via positive correlations with body and sexual attitudes. In Study 2, a subsample (N = 167) of participants from Study 1 completed an eye-tracking task to capture their gaze behavior toward matched images of partially and fully dressed female and male subjects. Men exhibited body-biased gaze behavior toward all the female imagery, whereas women exhibited head-biased gaze behavior toward fully clothed male imagery. Importantly, self-reported body gaze correlated positively with some aspects of objectively measured body gaze behavior. Both scales showed good test–retest reliability and were positively correlated with sexual assault attitudes.

Gaze behaviour, body image in women and online apparel shopping

“…Hypothesis 2. In line with research conceptualizing body gaze behaviour as a marker of objectifying attitudes and appearance-focused evaluations (Gervais et al, 2013;Gervais et al, 2018;Hollett et al, 2022), we expected that body-biased gaze behaviour would be positively correlated with (a) self-objectification and (b) appearance comparison attitudes.…”

“…Second, using experimental analyses, we aimed to test whether exposure to two popular women's apparel websites leads to differences in negative appearance attitudes, implicit self‐worth and body gaze behaviour towards images of women. In accordance with our aims, the following hypotheses were developed:Hypothesis In line with research linking media exposure to body image and self‐worth attitudes (Meier & Gray, 2014; Modica, 2019), we expected that self‐reported online apparel shopping behaviour would be positively correlated with (a) appearance importance and (b) self‐objectification but negatively correlated with (c) self‐reported trait self‐esteem. Hypothesis In line with research conceptualizing body gaze behaviour as a marker of objectifying attitudes and appearance‐focused evaluations (Gervais et al, 2013; Gervais et al, 2018; Hollett et al, 2022), we expected that body‐biased gaze behaviour would be positively correlated with (a) self‐objectification and (b) appearance comparison attitudes. Hypothesis We expected that shopping for objectifying activewear would prime (a) a negative body image attitude, (b) lower implicit self‐esteem and (c) a higher body‐biased gaze behaviour towards subsequent images of partially and fully dressed women, when compared with shopping for non‐objectifying casualwear. We also expected (d) an interaction effect, such that body‐biased gaze would be particularly high for the activewear condition when exposed to the subsequent partially dressed female subjects. Hypothesis As an exploratory analysis, we examined whether engagement with the apparel in both conditions, as measured by dollars spent, would be correlated with appearance, self‐objectification and self‐worth attitudes.…”

“…Consistent with prior eye-tracking studies (Hollett et al, 2022;Lykins et al, 2008;Nummenmaa et al, 2006), we included imagery of women in different states of dress (partially and fully dressed) in our gaze task. Participants in both conditions completed the same eyetracking task and were thus exposed to the same set of images.…”

“…Fixations towards each AOI were summed to determine the total duration (in milliseconds) spent fixating separately on the head and body. Similar to recent studies (Bareket et al, 2018; Hollett et al, 2022), we adopted a relative body gaze score, whereby head fixation time was subtracted from body fixation time. That is, larger and positive scores reflected greater body‐biased gaze behaviour.…”

“…However, because face gaze is a more naturalistic behaviour for women when exposed to non-sexualized imagery, it is plausible that idealized, but not sexualized, women's apparel imagery may prime more balanced gaze profiles (e.g., similar attention towards face and body). Indeed, some preliminary evidence from non-priming research suggests that women show more balanced gaze profiles when exposed to idealized, but not sexualized, female imagery (Hollett et al, 2022). Due to the idealized and sexualized nature of activewear imagery, it was expected that exposure to activewear would prime stronger body-biased gaze behaviour when compared with casualwear exposure.…”