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Sex Roles (2012) 66:617627 DOI 10.1007/s11199-011-0099-x
FEMINIST FORUM
Anti-fat Prejudice: The Role of Psychology in Explication, Education and Eradication
Maureen C. McHugh & Ashley E. Kasardo
Published online: 10 December 2011# Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2011
Abstract The field of psychologys explication of anti-fat prejudice and its impact on psychological practice in the U.S. is reviewed. The medical perspective that obesity is itself a disease or a psychological disorder and that fat is the cause of various physical or mental health conditions is challenged and viewed as contributing to weight-based prejudice in the U.S. The role of psychology in educating students and future practitioners about anti-fat bias and research on the ineffectiveness of dieting is examined. Research documenting anti-fat bias in the diagnosis and treatment of fat female clients in the U.S. is reviewed, and potential solutions for eradicating anti-fat prejudice in the clinical practice of psychology, including alternatives to dieting for women, are described.
Keywords Fat . Anti-fat prejudice . Weight discrimination . Sizism . Obesity. Size acceptance
Introduction
The research review by Fikkan and Rothblum (2011) presents a comprehensive review of the literature on weight-based discrimination against women in the United States. In free societies, bias, stigma, prejudice, and discrimination are considered inherently evil, seen as a threat to the health, happiness, and social status of those targeted, but also to a nations fundamental values of inclusion and equality (Brownell 2005, p. 1). Research, such as that reviewed by Fikkan and Rothblum, documents that fat people are stigmatized
and prejudiced against in our (U.S.) society, yet generally anti-fat bias and discriminatory behavior based on weight are not recognized as legitimate forms of oppression.
In addition to examining the relation of weight to education and employment, Fikkan and Rothblum examine the ways in which weight bias is present in medicine, focusing on how bias in medical practice represents a barrier to fat women getting appropriate medical care. In a small subsection of this part of their review, Fikkan and Rothblum briefly examine weight bias in mental health. Here we expand on their review, examining in more depth the ways that anti-fat bias has been both explicated by psychologists and evident in psychological practice in the United States. The field of psychology has a responsibility...