engleski

Cultural Effects On Adolescent Body Image, Dieting Behavior And Psychosocial Well-Being

Physical, psychological and social changes that occur during adolescence can markedly affect dietary habits and nutritional health. Physical changes including rapid growth place extra nutritional requirements on adolescents, while culture and society require adjustments in all of the aspects of daily living, including psychosocial well-being. Adolescents become focused on the physical appearance and any deviation from the ideal figure can result in negative dieting behavior, social withdrawal, poor self-esteem and increased health vulnerability. The paper presents some of the results of an international comparative study on risk and protective factors of adolescent health and well being, related to dieting behavior and body image and their relationship to psychological well-being. Within an ecological cultural framework, it looks at group-specific differences within different socio-cultural contexts across six European countries: two EU members (Italy and Austria) and four communities in the state of socioeconomic and political transition (Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Albania and Kosovo). In addition to socioeconomic differences related to various transition stages, each of these countries is situated on a cultural continuum ranging from high traditionalism and collectivistic values to individualism, including differences linked to changes in socialization values and parenting styles. Among other measures, the survey collected data from 4800 adolescents between 15 and 18 years of age, on BMI, nutrition habits, dieting, body image, self-esteem and life satisfaction. The study demonstrated a strong relationship between BMI and body dissatisfaction, as well as poor dietary habits, and their correlations with indicators of psychosocial well-being. In addition to expected marked gender differences in all countries, the obtained results indicate significant intracultural variations related to socioeconomic status as well as considerable intercultural variations due to variable influence of traditional cultural values in specific contexts.

Adolescents; Body image; BMI; Psychosocial well-being

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