Palmer, Sally B. and Rutland, Adam. 2011. Do children want skinny friends? The role of ‘weight’ in children’s friendship preferences and intergroup attitudes. Anales de Psicologia, 27(3), pp. 698-707. ISSN 0212-9728 [Article]

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Abstract or Description

This study examined developmental attitudes towards underweight stimuli using two different measures. Children aged 5 - 11 firstly attributed positive and negative traits to images of underweight, averageweight and overweight stimuli. A second measure investigated picture preference of the same stimuli for 3 different contexts (Total N=151). The trait attribution task revealed that weight bias overrode gender bias amongst female participants of all ages; girls significantly preferred underweight images to average-weight and overweight images. In the picture preference task, preferences for the underweight stimuli were given by both male and female 5 to 7 year olds, when selecting which stimuli they would have as a 'friend' or to 'take home to play'.

Item Type:	Article
Keywords:	underweight; children; weight bias; trait attribution; body type
Departments, Centres and Research Units:	Psychology
Dates:	Date Event 2011 UNSPECIFIED
Item ID:	12280
Date Deposited:	22 Jul 2015 12:48
Last Modified:	04 Jul 2017 12:43
Peer Reviewed:	Yes, this version has been peer-reviewed.
URI:	https://research.gold.ac.uk/id/eprint/12280

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