Our perceptions of body image are shaped by what we see from already seven years old, according to a new study by Durham University (United Kingdom).
These body ideals are still affected by visual exposure to different physical weights in adulthood, according to research.
The results show that people’s perceptions of body weight are flexible and adults for seven years and have consequences for understanding body and perceptions and possible misconceptions, weight in health and well -being.
Professor Lynda Boothroyd, from the Department of Psychology at Durham University, conducted a first study to examine the flexibility of body weight perceptions in children and young adults.
The study, published in the Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, found that children of seven years old adapt how heavy or light other people’s bodies rate after seeing a series of low or high weight photos.
The analysis revealed a significant shift in weight perceptions after exposing images depicting various physical weights. The results have shown that the way our brains represent what is “heavy” or “light” develops at a very young age.
Research, which included more than 200 people aged seven to adulthood, also said that the means that media influences are known to shape adult body perceptions can almost certainly affect children to the same degree, starting with early childhood and continue to develop.
It has been clear for many years that we need to be careful about the visual media that presents only a narrow range of bodies, because this affects the perceptions of the adult body.
Now we know that this is true for children. Even very neutral images can adjust their ideas for what is heavy or thin if they see enough of the same type of body. ”
Professor Lynda Boothroyd, chief writer
The experimental study adds to the wealth of research at Durham University for body perception and ideals of the body in both children and adults.
The team of Professor Boothroyd in Durham has previously shown that adult ideas about what is an “attractive” body weight or muscle mass are influenced by visual experience. This includes the effect of television access to body perceptions between remote communities in Latin America and, in a separate study, finding that white western women have lower body estimates and have more pressure than the media to be thin compared to black women.
Looking forward, the team is now exploring the best way to deal with body image worries in young adults around the world in an important £ 2m (€ 2.5m) research program and the development of new game techniques to explore its understanding of body weight and body weight.
Professor Boothroyd added: “Researchers often assume that children’s body perceptions and their ideas about body image in the same way as adults, we have shown that this is true, up to seven years, for basic perceptual impacts on the perception of body weight, but there are more to their body weight.
This new study included data gathered during the “Lower Scientist” event, which includes active families from local communities around Durham, UK in various research and educational activities.
In addition, the research involved stimuli provided by the University of Northumbria and contributions by a postdoctoral research partner at the University of Manchester.
Source:
Magazine report:
Batish, A., et al. (2025) The effects of body size have been adults from 7 years onwards. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology. Doi.org/10.1016/J.JECP.2025.106203.
