Sex and age‐related differences in perceived, desired and measured percentage body fat among adults

BACKGROUND: Body image distortion/discrepancy leads to psychological stress, disordered eating and mental and physical disease. To begin to assess body image distortion/discrepancy, we compared perceived, desired and measured percentage body fat in male versus female and college‐aged versus non‐coll...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of human nutrition and dietetics 2015-10, Vol.28 (5), p.486-492
Main Authors: Campisi, J, Finn, K. E, Bravo, Y, Arnold, J, Benjamin, M, Sukiennik, M, Shakya, S, Fontaine, D
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adipose Tissue
Adult
adults
Age differences
Age Factors
analysis of variance
blood pressure
Body Composition
body fat
Body Image
body image discrepancy
body image distortion
Body mass index
college students
cortisol
eating disorders
Emotions
Female
females
Gender differences
heart rate
Humans
Male
males
Perception
Perceptions
psychological stress
Sex Factors
stress
stress response
Stress, Psychological
Young Adult
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Summary:BACKGROUND: Body image distortion/discrepancy leads to psychological stress, disordered eating and mental and physical disease. To begin to assess body image distortion/discrepancy, we compared perceived, desired and measured percentage body fat in male versus female and college‐aged versus non‐college aged individuals. In addition, we assessed the acute stress response to body composition measurement. METHODS: Body fat percentage of 15 college aged (‘College Students’; CS) (mean = 19 years) and 16 non‐college aged (‘Non‐College Aged Students’; NCS) (mean = 39 years) males and females was assessed with the BodPod Body Composition Tracking System (Life Measurement Instruments, Concord, CA, USA). Participants indicated their perception of body fat and their desired body fat using a somatomorphic matrix. Salivary cortisol, heart rate and blood pressure were also measured. Data were analysed by analysis of variance and alpha was set at 0.05. RESULTS: Mean (SD) percentage body fat of males [15.2% (6.1%] was significantly lower than that of females [28.4% (6.4%)] (P 
ISSN:0952-3871
1365-277X
DOI:10.1111/jhn.12252