Her Own Worst Enemy: The Relationship Among Fat Talk, Weight Teasing, And Disordered Eating Behavior

Weight teasing is defined as negative remarks regarding one’s weight, such as joking or name calling. Fat talk is defined as patterns of discussion, often occurring among female friend groups that degrade the body weight or shape of oneself. Previous literature suggests that weight teasing and fat talk are significantly associated with disordered eating behavior. The purpose of the current study is to assess the moderating effects of fat talk in the relationship between weight teasing and disordered eating. Researchers hypothesized that the interaction between previous experiences of weight related teasing exhibited by family and/or peers and subsequent engagement in fat talk in the context of conversations with friends and family would significantly increase the likelihood for individuals to develop disordered eating behaviors compared to if only weight teasing, or only fat talk was reported. Fat talk was not found to be a moderating variable in the relationship between weight teasing and disordered eating behavior. Results indicated that a history of weight teasing, and especially current fat talk, accounted for a significant amount of variance in disordered eating behavior when considering the variables simultaneously.