The Body Image in Nature Study
There is a concept known as Human Universals (Brown, 1991) which are beliefs and behaviors common to all humans around the world such as rules against murder, incest, theft, lying, stealing, etc. And it has now become known that common body unhappiness or, more formally, normative discontent is also a human universal. Just about everybody on the planet wishes their body was different ranging from small ways to large ones. Now, a new worldwide study spanning 65 nations confirms that body appreciation is a healthy force for modifying body image concerns (Swami et al., 2023). Body appreciation has been a subject of scientific study for more than 15 years. It is defined as “accepting, holding favourable attitudes toward, and respecting the body, while also rejecting media-promoted appearance ideals as the only form of beauty” (Tylka & Wood-Barcalow, 2015, p. 53).
The study was conducted by The Body Image in Nature Survey (BINS) which is a researcher, crowd-sourced project of 253 scientists across 65 nations using the Body Appreciation Scale-2 (BAS-2). The BAS-2 is a 10-item questionnaire measuring body awareness and esteem (Tylka & Wood-Barcalow, 2015). The BAS-2 has allows researchers to see how body appreciation relates to acceptance, gratitude, psychological resiliency, and self-compassion; all extremely important factors underlying positive body image. Data was collected between November 2020 and February 2022 via community sampling with the majority of recruitment taking place online. The BINS demographics were:
Gender
56,968 respondents
58.9% (33,539) were women
40.5% (23,083) were men
0.6% (346) were of another gender identity
Race/Ethnicity
74.2%, (42,269) were part of a racial majority
11.3% (6448) were of a racial/ethnic minority
13.5% (7689) were undecided
Race data were not collected in France [1.0% or 562) because of a law restricting the collection and storage of race-based data.
Age
Participants ranged in age from 18 to 99 years
Education
0.5% (255) had no formal education
2.1% (1171) completed primary education
17.5% (9954) completed secondary education
33.5% (19,105) completed lower education
21.5% (12,274) completed higher tertiary education
21.5% (12,262) were in full-time education
3.4% (1947) had some other qualification.
Relationship Status
42.0%, (23,955) were single
19.5% (11,083) were in a committed relationship
33.5% (19,056) were married
5.0% (2874) had another status.
Financial Security
24.9% (14,157) felt less secure relative to others of their own age in their nation of residence
49.6% (28,266) felt equally secure
25.5% (14,545) felt more secure.
Residency
27.1% (15,408) lived in a capital city
13.7% (7811) in a suburb of a capital city
25.1% (14,319) in a provincial city (100,000 residents)
18.7% (10,680) in a provincial town (10,000+ residents)
15.4% (8750) in a rural area.
The Nature of Body Appreciation
Previous research into body appreciation found it is related to well-being, negative body image, and other mental health issues (Lindardon, 2021; Urke et al., 2021). Persons high in body appreciation are more resistant against media exposure to thin-ideal images while those with less are more vulnerable (Andrew, Tiggemann, & Clark, 2015). (See Linardon et al., 2022 for further discussion). The Tylka & Wood-Barcalow study found that the concept of body appreciation was held and understood the same across 65 nations. It is an essential concept in somatic existence. It also found that people who are single and live in rural areas have more body appreciation than city-dwellers. This may be due to less exposure to the media-generated ideals of physical beauty. Then again, folks that live in the countryside are more exposed to nature and this may affect the experience of the body-self. Being single and having higher body appreciation is puzzling. It may be that single people exercise greater personal freedom and so engage in more activities that bring self-satisfaction.
Closing Thoughts
Besides being a very powerful study as it is so large and wide-ranging, its results are important in that they establish that body appreciation is shared near universally by humans and is understood the same across cultures. Body appreciation is an essential component of positive embodied experience and a powerful tool for therapeutic intervention and somatic education.
Paul Shane, Ph.D., LMT
Director, Academic Content
References
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Updated 05-02-24.