Doctoral Dissertation Research: Cultural Models of Body Image and the Development of Mental Illness

身体形象障碍和饮食行为失调伴随着最致命的精神疾病，并且越来越普遍。然而，与女性相比，研究人员对男性如何经历饮食失调和身体形象知之甚少。对饮食失调相关研究结果有效性的科学信心也需要更多具有代表性的样本，以探索对这些疾病的反应有哪些可变性。除了提供资金培训一名人类学研究生学习经验、科学数据收集和分析的方法外，该项目还将通过向投资于寻找更有效的方法向公众传播科学的组织广泛传播其研究结果，增进对科学的理解。这项研究的结果将以这样一种方式传播，以帮助研究人员、临床医生、教育工作者和政策制定者制定更好的政策和计划，以预测和减轻这种文化身体态度对身心健康的影响。在阿拉巴马大学William Dressler博士的指导下，Lawrence Monocello将探索身体形象的文化模式及其对精神疾病发展的结构性影响。为了应对不确定和不断变化的经济环境、迅速全球化的媒体和不断变化的性别规范，美国关于男性身体和身体形象的文化观念越来越关注审美表现，而不是身体能力（即，将身体视为一种可供观赏的对象，而不是运动、劳动或保护的工具）。这种身体态度会显著增加进食障碍的易感性。相比之下，这项研究研究的是一群已经陷入崇拜男性审美身体形象的文化体系中的男性。此次调查将在韩国经济、教育、文化之都首尔进行。首尔拥有韩国最成功的企业、最著名的大学和主要的娱乐集团。研究人员将重点关注18-30岁的男性如何概念化男性身体理想，试图在自己的身体中实现这些理想，并在更大的文化环境中理解他们自己的个人身体形象体验。他们会发展出一种身体不满意的衡量标准，考虑到该文化所认可的特定文化的身体理想。研究人员将利用人口统计变量，以及个人对男性理想身材的认知、对理想身材的认同和对身体的不满，以及长期深入的访谈，探索这些因素是如何影响男性饮食失调行为的发展的。这项研究的结果将有助于我们了解，生活在崇尚男性美学而非肌肉发达的文化环境中的男性，是如何面对符合身体形象标准的压力的。然后，这些见解可以用于开发干预措施，以对抗致命的身体形象相关疾病。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Body image disturbance and disordered eating behaviors accompany the deadliest of all mental illnesses and are increasingly prevalent. However, relative to women, researchers know comparatively little about how men experience eating disorders and body image. Scientific confidence in the validity of findings related to eating disorders also requires more representative samples that explore what variability there is in responses to these illnesses. In addition to providing funding for the training of a graduate student in anthropology in the methods of empirical, scientific data collection and analysis, the project would enhance scientific understanding by broadly disseminating its findings to organizations invested in discovering more effective methods for communicating science to the public. The findings of this research will be disseminated in such a way to aid researchers, clinicians, educators, and policymakers develop better policies and programs that anticipate and mitigate the effects of such cultural body attitudes on and mental health.Lawrence Monocello, under the supervision of Dr. William Dressler of the University of Alabama, will explore cultural models of body image and the structural influences that they have on development of mental illness. Responding to uncertain and shifting economic environments, rapidly globalizing media, and changing gender norms, cultural ideas about men's bodies and body image in the United States increasingly focus on aesthetic presentation over physical prowess (i.e., valuing the body as an object to be looked at rather than a tool for athletics, labor, or protection). This kind of body attitude that significantly increases vulnerability to eating disorders. By contrast, this research studies a population of men already mired in a cultural system that venerates an aesthetic male body image. This research will be conducted in Seoul, South Korea which is the economic, educational, and cultural capital, hosting its most successful companies, most celebrated universities, and major entertainment conglomerates. Researchers will focus on how men, ages 18-30, conceptualize male body ideals, attempt to enact them in their own bodies, and make meaning of their own individual body image experience within the larger cultural environment. They will develop a measure of body dissatisfaction that considers the culturally particular body ideals endorsed by that culture. Using demographic variables alongside measures of individuals' knowledge of male body ideals, concordance with body ideals, and body dissatisfaction, followed by long-term, in-depth interviews, the researchers will explore how each of these factors affects the development of disordered eating behaviors in men. Findings from this research will provide insight into how men living in cultural environments that endorse male aesthetics over brawn navigate pressures to conform to body image standards. These insights can then be used to develop interventions that will combat deadly body image-related disorders.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.