Das Körperbild von Jugendlichen in der Schweiz – Studienergebnisse

Abstract

People with a positive body image are more content with their body, reflect their society's beauty ideals more critically, have the ability to care for their body and are better protected from depression. Adolescence represents a particularly critical period relating to the development of the body image. The results of 1023 adolescents between the age of 13 and 16 years are unambiguous: In both analyzed language parts of the country, the positive body image correlates significantly positive with mental health and significantly negative with the influence by the media. For the future it is recommended to develop target-group-specific and gender-specific awareness and communication measures, particularly by including social media, as well as associated means to strengthen adolescents' mental health.

Psychological correlates of body dissatisfaction in Swiss youth over a one-year study-period

“…This is consistent with previous research, which indicates that BD is a prevalent and normative discontent in Western society populations, particularly during adolescence and young adulthood -a period characterized by heightened vulnerability in the onset and intensification of BD (e.g., Tantleff-Dunn et al, 2011;Rickwood, 2015;Wang et al, 2019). The results of our study are in line with other research conducted in the German-speaking region, which revealed that only 35% of females and 56% of males aged 13-17 were satisfied with their appearance (Widmer et al, 2018), while 40% of 16-20-yearold females and 18% of males reported BD (Narring et al, 2004). Consistent with our hypothesis, there was a significant positive association between BD and the psychological factors of ERD and ARS at both waves.…”

“…Moreover, our study findings cannot be generalized to the entire Swiss youth population, as the online-questionnaire study solely involved adolescents and young adults from the German-speaking region. As previous Swiss studies (e.g., Widmer et al, 2018) have identified differences in BD between Swiss language regions, future investigations should also include French-and Italian-speaking youth. It should further be noted that we shortened the Appearance-Based Rejection Sensitivity Scale (ARS-D; Schmidt and Martin, 2017), leading to reduced internal consistency and lower reliability values compared to those denoted in the literature (see assessment instruments; Park, 2007;Schmidt and Martin, 2017).…”

“…Given that, high BD may hinder a healthy transition from adolescence into adulthood and relates to the development of mental health impairment ( McLean et al, 2022 ). In a recent report published by Health Promotion Switzerland, it was found that only 35% of females and 56% of males aged 13–17 ( n = 371; 47.4% females) expressed satisfaction with their appearance ( Widmer et al, 2018 ). These prevalence rates of BD in Swiss youth are comparable with previous research conducted in Europe, Australia and the North America ( Frisén et al, 2015 ; Aanesen et al, 2017 ; Hoffmann and Warschburger, 2018 ; Wang et al, 2019 ; Lacroix et al, 2022 ; McLean et al, 2022 ).…”