The vast majority of theses in this collection are open access and freely available. There are a small number of theses that have access restricted to the WWU campus. For off-campus access to a thesis labeled "Campus Only Access," please log in here with your WWU universal ID, or talk to your librarian about requesting the restricted thesis through interlibrary loan.

Date Permissions Signed

11-11-2011

Date of Award

2011

Document Type

Masters Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science (MS)

Department

Psychology

First Advisor

Lemm, Kristi M., 1971-

Second Advisor

Czopp, Alex

Third Advisor

Lehman, Barbara J.

Abstract

Weight bias is prevalent, detrimental, and resistant to change. This study provided a general student sample and a healthcare provider sample with information about behavioral, environmental, or biogenetic causes of obesity to compare resulting anti-fat attitudes. Across conditions, the healthcare providers were less likely to agree that obesity is personally controlled, and demonstrated more positive implicit attitudes than did the general students. Among general students, implicit anti-fat attitudes were impervious to reduction efforts across article conditions. Among healthcare providers, implicit anti-fat attitudes improved with biogenetic explanations and did not worsen with behavioral explanations relative to the control group. No such condition differences were apparent among explicit anti-fat attitudes, which were generally less negative than implicit attitudes. These results highlight potentially important differences between people with varied investment in health related information. While reminders of causes of obesity may not make attitudes toward obese people better among the general population, and can even make them worse, biogenetic explanations may be especially suited to improve negative associations held by healthcare practitioners. The implications of these findings include applications that could improve healthcare conditions for a growing physically and socially vulnerable population.

Type

Text

DOI

https://doi.org/10.25710/mycx-9q30

Publisher

Western Washington University

OCLC Number

768772006

Subject – LCSH

College students--Attitudes; Medical personnel--Attitudes; Overweight persons--Public opinion; Physical-appearance-based bias; Discrimination against overweight persons

Format

application/pdf

Genre/Form

masters theses

Language

English

Rights

Copying of this document in whole or in part is allowable only for scholarly purposes. It is understood, however, that any copying or publication of this thesis for commercial purposes, or for financial gain, shall not be allowed without the author's written permission.

Download

Share

COinS