Well I’ll be damned. Who would’ve thought that feminists were real people subject to socialization just like everyone else?

In good news, the authors of the paper recognise this. They say in the Discussion: “In general, this would seem to provide support for the suggestion that the thin ideal is so pervasive in contemporary cultures that even women who self-identify as being feminists are not protected against the internalisation of this ideal”

They also recognise the limitations of the single-item feminist self-ascription scale:

“A number of limitations to this study are also worth noting. First, single-item feminist ascription scales do not capture the complexity of feminist beliefs, and being a ‘feminist’ may mean different things to different people (McCabe, 2005; Swami & Tovée, 2006). This is also important because different aspects of feminist beliefs may be related to body image in different ways (Myers & Crowther, 2007). Future work would, therefore, do well to include multi-item feminist ascription scales (e.g., the Feminist Perspectives Scale; Henley, Meng, O’Brien, McCarthy, & Sockloskie, 1998), or failing that, a continuous single-item scale of feminist ascription. ”

The paper concludes:

“Although it may not be the perfect buffer against thin-ideal internalisation, feminism does appear to afford women a more inclusive perception of who is physically attractive. That is, feminist beliefs appear to allow women to counter the prevailing stigma attached to overweight and obese bodies, even if feminist women do not radically differ from their non-feminist counterparts in their perception of maximally attractive figures. Identifying specific aspects of feminism that influence the rejection of society’s objectification of the female body may prove important for the conceptualisation of positive body image.”

The pictures are in grey-scale, rather than in colour. I am guessing that all this is so that the study participants rate body size and nothing else, including skin colour.

As an additional note, they are all pale-skinned. Pic here.

Secondly, are there actually people out there who think that the most important thing is for women to be thin?

Oh, hell, yeah.

Firstly, not to be judgmental or exclusive, but any self-described feminist who does think the most important thing for women is to be thin is no feminist.

Secondly, are there actually people out there who think that the most important thing is for women to be thin? Not even stylish, beautiful, or graceful, never mind well-spoken, intelligent, witty, funny, socially concerned, judicious, a real balls-breaker, etc?

I think if we are to gauge the moment at which our civilization has fully disintegrated, it will be when half the population’s primary goal in life is to be as small as possible. Please, someone, tell me we’re not there yet?

Question: does “non-feminist” mean something beyond just “non-” + “feminist”? Because you seem to take it mean “anti-feminist” or “sexist” or “chauvinist” or something, and I don’t see why.

The demographic characteristics (age, weight, education, pay) of both groups were similar, although interestingly non-feminists were better educated, but feminist better paid (who says it doesn’t pay off!!). No characteristic other than feminist identification was found to influence people’s sense of attractiveness.

The ‘ideal’ body, for both groups, had a BMI of 18.45, which falls into the underweight category.

There were ten bodies ranging in weight from the medical categories of emaciated through to obese. Participants were asked to rate the bodies between 1-not at all and 9 extremely ‘physically attractive’. They were additionally asked which body was most physically attractive; which was the largest body they found physically attractive and which was the smallest body they found physcially attractive. Except for figures 3 and 4 (which were the underweight and normal weight), Feminists rated all ten bodies more attractive than non-feminists. This effect was particularly noticeable among the heavier bodies, suggesting that feminists found fatter woman significantly more attractive than non-feminist women. Feminist had a ’signficantly higher’ AR than non-feminists- which means they were more accepting of a wider range of body shapes.

The ten pictures are of real women who fall into different weight categories. They are all wearing identical leotards and leggings- not flattering but not dreadful either. From their body shapes, I am guessing they are wearing underwear underneath. They are standing faced forward with their arms held at 45 degree angles to their bodies. They have a black spot over their faces so they cannot be identified. The pictures are in grey-scale, rather than in colour. I am guessing that all this is so that the study participants rate body size and nothing else, including skin colour. As the researchers comment, as these are real women, there are differences in body shape, leg length etc, which could also influence people’s sense of what is attractive. It is a bit of a weird image, but you do get a good sense of these women’s lumps and bumps, which I think is kind of cool.

Anyway hope this helps.

Full disclosure here, as a gay man some would say I may not be the best arbiter of female attractiveness, but if I had to judge a faceless body in tight, ill fitting clothes, there are not many examples I can think that I would refer to as “attractive”, even if it was the traditionally positioned “attractive” tall and svelte size 2.

Cara’s point that the humanity is stripped in this example by obscuring the face, is not a small concern. For me, is the root of attraction.