Gender differences in the interrelationships between weight dissatisfaction, restraint, and self-esteem

This study investigated the interrelationships between weight, weight dissatisfaction, restraint, and self-esteem in a group of young adult women and men. The subjects were students at the Flinders University of South Australia, whose student body consists of primarily local students from English-speaking backgrounds. A tentative causal model proposed actual overweight to lead to body dissatisfaction, which causes the person to diet, with the resulting failures leading to loss of self-esteem. This model was confirmed by path analysis for women, but not for men. In line with self-concept theory, subjective overweight was more strongly related to self-esteem for women than for men, with restraint mediating this relationship.