Should I Delete That? - How to feel better about our bodies... with Professor Phillippa Diedrichs

Episode Date: January 9, 2025

Phillippa Diedrichs is a Professor of Psychology and body image and mental health expert. She works at the Centre for Appearance Research and has spent the last 20 years studying body confidence - what influences how we think and feel about how we look and what we can do as a society to create an environment where we can accept and love our bodies. She also works with brands and organisations within the beauty and fitness industries to help them think about what they put out into the world, and how they can be part of the solution to help create a world that is accepting of bodies of all sizes. This series grew so much bigger than we ever expected it to be thanks to the amazing insights our guests gave us - so we decided to release some of those expert conversations in their entirely. Each Thursday, you will hear an in depth conversation which will drill down into different themes which we will explore across the eight weeks of this series. This is the first of those conversations and we hope you love it. Follow @phillippa.diedrichs on InstagramRead more about Phillippa’s work at https://www.phillippadiedrichs.com/ If you would like to get in touch - you can email us on [e-mail] us on Instagram:@shouldideletethat@em_clarkson@alexlight_ldnShould I Delete That is produced by Faye LawrenceMusic: Dex RoyStudio Manager: Dex RoyTrailers: Sophie RichardsonVideo Editor: Celia GomezSocial Media Manager: Emma-Kirsty FraserArtwork: Alex Andrew Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello and welcome back to Should I Delete That. Guys, it's officially launched. On Monday we started our brand new podcast series, all about body image. We began by taking a look back at the history of diet culture. Spoiler alert, it's wild. So make sure you go back and listen to that episode if you haven't already. But for the next few weeks, we're going to be doing something a little different to usual with our Thursday episodes. This series grew so much bigger than we.

ever anticipated it to be. And that's mostly thanks to the incredible guests we had on who gave us just so much insight on a huge range of topics. You'll be hearing from our guests at different points throughout the series, but we decided that on Thursdays we're going to release some of our chats with our experts in their entirety. These are going to be really in-depth conversations which will drill down into different themes which we're going to explore over the next few weeks. But don't worry, is it just me, we'll return as usual in the spring. Today you'll be hearing from Professor Philippa Diedrichs. She is a professor of psychology and body image and a mental health expert. We wanted to speak to her as part of the series to take a look at the psychology

behind our relationships with our bodies and how we might be able to work to improve these relationships on both the personal and societal level. This chat touches on themes that you're going to hear throughout the series generational dieting trauma, OZMPIC, the media and body positivity. So we thought that this was a great place to start our in-depth investigation. into the world of body image. We'll be back on Monday where we're going to be asking the question, what is an almond mum? But for now, here's Professor Philippa Diedrichs. Philippa, can you just start by introducing yourself to us and what you do? Yeah, absolutely. So I am a research psychologist and a professor of psychology. I work at the Centre for Appearance Research,

which is a university research center specialising in science that tries to understand how we feel about our bodies. And so for several decades now, 20 years I've been studying body confidence, what influences how we think and feel about the way we look, but also what can we do in society, whether that's workshops for individuals or working with companies or working with media, to kind of create an environment and a world where we can accept and respect. our bodies, but also that we can express our identities and who we are through our appearance in a way that feels good to us. So we've been developing programs for body confidence, for young people that have been delivered to over 100 million young people around the world,

which is really good. And importantly, we've tested them to make sure they work. And then I spent a lot of time as well working with brands and organizations in the beauty industry, the fitness industry to help them and the people that are working in those brands think about what they put out there and what they do and to minimise harm, but more importantly, actually, how can they be part of a solution to creating a society that's more accepting of bodies and diversity? Amazing. I mean, all of that is why we are so excited to talk to you for this series and hear your

perspective on a lot of big hard-hitting topics, one of which we're going to go straight into generational dieting trauma. Please could you explain to us what this is? So I think what we're really referring to here is how our ideas about our bodies weight and eating and probably dieting in particular get passed down across generations in families. And often what people think about is mothers and how mothers have passed this down to their children and how that continues. What we know from the research, though, it's not just moms. It's also dads. It's also extended family members, particularly if you come from a collectivist culture, done a lot of research with South Asian people and their family and their extended family is very important. And a lot

of them can remember aunties and uncles making comments about their appearance. And what happens is we experience that as children and then what unfortunately will happen is we can then pass it on to our own children or the young people that we have in our lives. And so it's basically how this cycle continues of diet culture, but also disordered eating and low body confidence gets passed down through generations. It may evolve slightly over time in terms of what is disgust and how it manifests, but essentially it's that passing down. And sometimes people are aware of it and sometimes they're not. It's so interesting. It's come from dads. We had that conversation recently and it's something we hadn't considered ourselves, but good that it's not

just on moms. However, it does, that does feel like a big, like connection that we can, that we can see at least anecdotally, that kind of seems like a very, or even personally, that's a, That's a place that I think I probably first became aware of dieting was from my own mum. Why were our mom's, in your opinion, why were our mum's generation so intent on instilling the virtuiness of thinness in us? And how do you think that harmed us as individuals and as a collective? Yeah, I think my mum and I've talked about this as well. I went to Weight Watchers when I was 13. But I also know, and my mom says to me, oh my God, you must tell people the story. and they must be horrified.

And I'm like, Mom, you also went to Weight Watchers when you were younger. And my Nana, who I am very close to my mum and I was very close to my Nana, she also went to Weight Watchers. And so it's a really tricky one. I think as parent, I'm not a parent, but you both are. And I think most parents try to do the best that they can with what they know. And I think women historically have society has been shaped in a way such that women are valued based upon how they look and weight has been central to that and thinness has been glorified. And also generationally, if you look at baby boomers and before that, they were still of a generation where education, workplace opportunities and all sorts of those things were incredibly unequalified.

between women and men, and women were highly valued for how they look. Of course, we still have those problems today, but they were even more so back then. So when I think about it, and I still hear people tell me now that, you know, my mum and I have had lots of conversations, and now she's a bit of a body image advocate in her own circles, but still experience that, and they may be more aware of body positivity and body image themselves, but they go home or they talk to their parents, and they're still kind of their mums in particular, still heavily focused on weight. I have a lot of compassion and empathy for the individuals, the parents, and the children of this cycle. And I have a lot of frustration and anger about the society that perpetuates this.

So often we think about blaming individuals, but there are bigger forces at play that everyone has been exposed to, particularly in those generations. The original body positivity movement was really in the 70. with black fat activists in North America. Well, my mom grew up in New Zealand and I'm pretty sure there was no body positivity and they didn't have social media. It was mainstream culture. So it's all of those factors combined, which is why I think this is happening.

Of course, now we also have a really strong conflation between weight and health. So it sometimes can be teasing and negative. comments quite explicit. But sometimes it's through concern. I genuinely think the reason my mom took me to Weight Watchers is I was probably, I can remember being teased about my weight when I was in grade four and specific things. And I would have been coming home and telling her about that. And that then weight loss was very normalized. It still is to an extent. And that was sold as a solution. So she wanted me to feel good about myself. So she took me to Weight Watchers. Now she would think differently. But that's probably because she has a daughter who

specialises in body image and as a professor of psychology. Not everyone has that. And not everyone like your listeners has access or has thought about body positivity in this way. So I have a lot of compassion and empathy for individuals, a lot of anger and frustration at the system and society. For anyone listening who has, and historically has had this complicated relationship with their moms or another parent or, you know, extended family members. Do you think, I mean, you said that you, you, you, we believe that we owe them compassion. Do we owe them forgiveness? Would you encourage anyone listening to try and forgive their family for, you know, you know, passing on generational dieting trauma? I think that's so nuanced and complex that

I think everyone's situation is different. And also that can place a lot of burden on the victim, even though the perpetrator might be a victim as well. So I don't think I have a blanket response to that idea of forgiveness. I think probably taking a step back to think about why they're doing what they're doing, what pressures they've been exposed to, might create a little bit of a buffer between your intensity of your emotions to that person. It might not absolve them though.

And, you know, I think one of the other things, although I think compassion is important, boundaries are important too. So you can be compassionate, but you can also set boundaries to be like, I don't, you know, that doesn't make me feel comfortable or I don't want to talk about weight or dieting or eating with you because of these reasons. And if someone continues to do that when you've tried to set a boundary, well, no, that's not okay, even if they've experienced those things. So I think setting healthy boundaries and being like, you know, if they continue to transgress those boundaries, if you do this, then I will do

this, which I will remove myself from that situation or I, you know, I'll do whatever. So I think it's complex and I think the compassion though doesn't mean you can't set boundaries and it doesn't mean that you have to put up with something that makes you feel uncomfortable. What is important to know, though, is that when we experience that and we can have awareness of the pain that it caused, there's research showing that if you experience it, you're more likely to pass it down to your children as well. So there's this amazing study which has been going on for over 20 years in the US. It's called Project Eat, and it's by a group of researchers that's led by,

a woman called Professor Dianne Newmark Steiner, and they have been tracking who were teenagers in 1998, 1999. They're still tracking them now, so over 20 years, and they've been measuring their body image, their eating behaviours, their weight, other health markers. And now a lot of those teenagers are parents themselves. And they've been publishing studies over the years. And one of the most recent studies,

because we've had a lot of research, that's just kind of showing a correlation between if you experienced diet talk and that kind of stuff when you were growing up, you're likely to have worse body image. But we hadn't actually tracked them over time and then seeing how it gets passed again to the next generation. And in this study of over 500 adolescents, they found that if these teenagers grew up experiencing encouragement to diet or discussions about weight talk, they were more likely to have low body confidence, problematic relationship with food or a

complex relationship with food, disordered eating the things that we're talking about now. Interestingly, those same adolescents now have their own children. And in their home environments now, there's a greater weight focus as well. So there's a sense that by being aware of this, you can grieve that experience. And then also think about how we're going to disrupt that

and change it for the next generation, whether you're a parent or not thinking about the young people around you. on a practical level when it comes to breaking generational trauma of this nature within ourselves if we know where it's come from we're listening to this we can identify and recognize what you're saying as like applying to us what are the steps we can take as individuals to try and break that so that we don't then pass it on to the young people around us i think um listening to podcasts like this and trying to look at read and listen to podcasts and really look after your own body image because by looking after your own body image and healing that relationship, you will

naturally pass that on to the people that are around you. It's a bit like put your oxygen mask on first when you're on a flight. It's the same thing. When you have to start working to accept and appreciate your own body, it forces you to confront a lot of the biases that we've internalized. It forces you to consider how the people around you have affected you, and equally we affect those that are around us. And it's tricky because sometimes some of the things that we can do when we're healing

our own body image or struggling can actually perpetuate the problem. So as a starting point, body talk free zones, so just not talking about bodies and appearance until you feel like you can comfortably, you know, compliment someone based on how they look in a way that doesn't reinforce a narrow beauty standard. I think having, if you feel comfortable and you have that kind of relationship, having a conversation with your parent or whoever it was and being, and kind of, if you can, frame, like, I remember this happening. I wonder what were the conversations about weight and dieting when you were growing up?

What do you remember your parents saying? Where do you think they got that from? What do you think about it now? I've been reading this or I listen to this podcast talking about this topic and use that as a conversation starter and see how far you get and then practicing setting boundaries. And then I think that idea of healing your own relationship with your body, you will naturally pass that on. The EZM pick, craze.

Yeah. I mean, it's been a, it's been a bit of a frenzy for a while now, but it feels like it's a fever pitch right about now. why do you think OZMPIC and all of its, you know, JLP1 counterpart, why do you think they have become so wildly popular? I think it's another supposedly quick fix solution to weight and dieting. It's marketed as something that is easily accessible. It will help you lose weight.

And, you know, we've seen lots of. prominent people in the media who have used it, who have sung its praises. And I've heard from people I know in my life who have used it, but also other anecdotes that people say that it can get rid of the food noise. So when you've had struggled with food and weight for your whole life, effectively what they do is they suppress your appetite and curb your appetite. And so you're not thinking about food as much. And some people, that's a massive relief to not be thinking about food. So I think that is a very attractive proposition. Just, you know, use this pen once a week and you're not going to think about food as much. You'll lose weight. I also think it helps

people feel like they have some control. And, you know, we still live in a society that glorifies thinness and praises people for weight, their weight loss. And so if this is available, I've tried everything else. People are telling me and scientists are saying this, why wouldn't I do it? You know, so it's a very attractive proposition. All of the things that I've just said have been the same things that have been said about many other weight loss schemes in the past. What you will hear in some form of media, if you read the New York Times or time or you read scientific journals is it's not as simple or clear cut as that but that's not the message that's out there more broadly and it's so intoxicating so intoxicating to think if I

just give it a go and I've yeah got people in my life who've said it to me I got married this year and I thank you and even as a body image researcher and professor I still struggle struggle with body image sometimes. I think overall, I have positive body image, but it's not perfect. And, you know, as we know, it ebbs and flows. But even, you know, it's really hard to get a nice wedding dress of natural fabrics if you're in a size over size 14. And I remember this is wild thoughts. You know how you kind of have irrational thoughts popping into my, and I was like, maybe I should like, I haven't dieted for years, but maybe and then like, maybe I should try that. and well, I could just, you know, use that.

And I was like, immediately I had that and I discounted it. But I'm like, how wild is that? Because it's so intoxicating to have this idea that you could just do this and you will lose weight. Like you say, we've been sold another dream because that's all it's ever really been. It's been like this magic cure. There's been a million magic cures over my lifetime, our lifetimes over all of it. Undisputed is that it does work.

but for some people, for some things. So I want to be careful to ask you a harder question to answer and with a lot of nuance. Do you think it can be a positive tool for weight loss or does it just end up being a plaster because we've not dealt with this? It doesn't help you deal with the psychological issues that you might have with food or eating.

Does it work in the first place? So there's a lot of research looking at the short-term effects of it. and what you see is people tend to lose weight. The extent of the weight loss though varies depending on the person, the dosage, etc. And sometimes it can be around 20%. But there's very limited long-term evidence. So we know it works in the short term for some people, but there's very limited evidence to show what happens in the long term.

it's a lifetime drug so it's not something that you can just use for a year or two you have to use it for the rest of your life if you want to maintain those effects and the providers and the experts tell you that and the people who created it it's a lifetime drug so you're signing up to that and there's research showing if you stop using it you're likely to regain at least two-thirds of the weight that you lost. And also any of the potential health benefits to cardiovascular health. So we need a lot more research looking at the long-term effects. We know that when people stop, they regain. It's also incredibly expensive. So prices vary, but you know, you're spending at least 250 pounds a month. In some cases in the US, it costs around on average $1,300 a month.

So you multiply that across, you know, the year and how much that cost, then across the lifespan, how much you're spending on this drug. We also know it has side effects, so 20% of people experience nausea, around 10% experience vomiting and diarrhea. And what happens when you stop if you can no longer afford it, or perhaps there's a surge in demand and it's not readily available, or, you know, eventually if more research comes out about the side effects, what happens then? And you're exactly right what you said. And Tressie McMillan Cottom, who's an amazing scholar and writer that I would recommend everyone

check out. She's written a lot about a Zen pic. And she basically summarised, she referred to Zemphic, but you could apply it to the weight loss injectables in general. Zempic can't fix what our culture has broken. And it speaks to this issue that it will suppress your appetite, but it doesn't deal with any of the psychological, social or emotional factors associated with eating and weight. And that's really difficult and problematic because most people who are considering taking these drugs, a lot of them will probably be in larger bodies. And if you live in a larger body in today's society, you are likely to have experienced bias and prejudice at school in the workplace at home and in lots of different settings. You're also likely to have tried

dieting in the past because you've been encouraged to do so. And that creates a really complex relationship with food and a complex relationship with your body. So you have a drug that suppresses your appetite, but it doesn't address your relationship with food or your relationship with your body. And then often what happens when people lose weight, they get a lot of positive reinforcement from other people like, you look amazing, have you lost weight? So they're likely to probably get a lot of positive reinforcement as well. And that's sending them the message, okay, so was I perhaps not as attractive or valuable before? And then that makes people question their self-worth. Also, if you look at the biggest predictors of our weight, our weight is

determined by multiple things, genetics, behaviours, emotional factors, but importantly, social and economic factors. One of the best predictors of your body weight is your socio-economic status. The poorer you are, the more likely you are to have a higher body weight. And if you think about society that we live in like a desk culture, access to fruit and vegetables that are fresh and affordable, being able to exercise outside in safe spaces, clothing availability, the availability of therapy and treatment, all of these things are not readily available. And what these drugs do is put the onus on the individual to solve a problem that is societal, that's psychological and emotional. Not to mention the people

who might have had eating disorders and who may get access to this when they're not at a higher body weight and there's a risk of abuse like we've seen with laxatives and other diet supplements and pills. So it's very complex and despite the fact that it is intoxicating and it may work in the short term, you're signing up to a lifetime expense and if you stop taking it, chances are you going to regain all of that weight? And how does that make you feel? Everyone who has dieted knows that cycle of yo-yo dieting, the shame, the guilt. We also know there's a lot of research showing that weight fluctuation going up and down all the time is really can be, have long-term damages to your health. So those are the things that we need to be talking about

as well when we talk about that. And that's not readily available on the websites when you go to buy these drugs. I could listen to you to all. I know you're so good for. I know. I know. I But I've got so much to ask as well. My God, it's like, and I don't even know if this is a question. I guess this is me just thinking out loud. And speaking, I guess, on behalf of people who are, for whom OZempic is super appealing because of the food noise aspect that you explained. As someone who's, you know, for whom food has, food and eating has dominated my life

and my thoughts since forever, since I can remember, you know, it's like food has always been a source of comfort. It's been a way for me to self-regulate. It's been a way for me to control my emotions. And the idea of not having, you know, inevitably I guess that kind of led to binge eating disorder, which is something that has never really fully left me. And the idea of eliminating that, eliminating that food noise is so appealing. I see the allure of that. Weight loss aside for getting weight loss. Yeah. And I do think this is a huge component to the ozempic popularity right is that it would take that away and putting you on the spot here what would you say to people who are tempted by it for that reason and what would say

to me as well I guess asking for myself as well it's a really good question we don't have long-term studies of people with binge eating disorders a really obvious one for those people who binge eating disorders having you know uncontrollable episodes of eating lots of food um and it's very you know emotionally laid and a lot of shame associated with it and it is very appealing right but what it will the question only about it being a band-aid you won't have those feelings potentially of the hunger cues and really interestingly one of the things we do when in disorder eating is shut down those cues and shut down listening to our body, shut down when we've eaten, you know, when we feel full, shut down when we're hungry. And so much of society helps us disconnect

from our internal cues because we're working because, you know, you can't eat till it's lunchtime at school, et cetera. So I think it will remove one part, but it's not going to heal the other bits and food in our culture is a huge social aspect there can be a lot of pleasure from food and also in the longer term I worry about then by eliminating hunger signals and becoming more out of touch with our bodies the longer term effects of that I worry about abuse because you start to do it and then you want to do it more and more and more and then if you lose weight you probably get positive reinforcement in some parts of your life and that becomes this negative cycle. And eating disorders are complex. There's genetic reasons. There's sometimes trauma

involved as a child, not to do with weight and eating, but other things. It's not going to fix that. So all of those issues are still going to be there as well. So although it might feel alluring in the short term, I think in the longer term, it won't necessarily help. All of those feelings will still be there. And also the amount of money that you're going to spend to access that, it's really hard to access therapy or other forms of treatment because of cost. But if you're accessing these drugs, unless it's prescribed through a doctor for other medical reasons, but it won't be technically at the moment for weight loss,

you could spend that money on healing your relationship with food in other ways and taking that noise away. It might be harder work in the short term or the medium term because it's hard work to do that emotionally. But the benefits in the longer term, and they're going to be with you whether or not you can afford these drugs in future, whether you can tolerate the side effects or not. It's tricky.

And also, we don't know the harms, the full harms of these drugs. And I think for people with eating disorders, that's why a lot of this conversation can be very triggering and can make you question yourself and all the hard work that you've done to heal your relationship with eating and food. No, your answer is spot on. And I guess it's the thing that none of us want to hear is like there is no quick fix for any of this, not for weight loss, not for fixing your relationship with food. Like just the way that we've had a thousand diets come and go before ozempic you know this can't this this this is not the silver bullet either it can't it can't yeah and i want to read this just quickly this one quote which was actually i'm going to read it

so that i don't paraphrase it and this is one of the scientists who was involved in developing the active ingredient and a lot of these injectables and they've been interviewed recently and said once you've been on um this semaglutide which is the active ingredient for a year or two life is so miserably boring that you can't stand it any longer and you have to go back to your life. This is someone who was involved in creating the active ingredient, which these drugs were originally for diabetes as well, not just for weight loss. And I think what that quote, though, it sounds a bit flippant, but what it's really speaking to is the fact that doesn't address the emotional, social, psychological and sides of eating and weight, which is so complex. And if people

are at the stage where they're willing to spend 250 pounds a month on something like this, chances are they've got quite a complex or nuanced history with eating their relationship with their body the way in which their appearance and weight has influenced their self-worth and how others have treated them chances are if you're considering doing that there's a story there and that story is ignored if you just access these drugs and it gets prescribed to you really easily you have very little long ongoing psychological support or treatment with them. We are seeing already not just, because it's been a couple of years now since we started seeing celebrities, the effects of celebrities using these drugs. We are now seeing it amongst

our friends, amongst perhaps communities that we're part of online in influences. We are seeing it's infiltrated our lives. What effect do you think that has, because it is one of the other people we spoke to for this series described it as like the sort of like slimming down. of the body positivity movement, which is kind of tragic as a sentence, to be honest. What do you think that this means, this trend will mean for those who exist within larger bodies and for how they live as a whole, for their lives as a whole? Well, I think because it is very much an individual solution, right? It's like you as an individual do this and you change your body weight.

there can be this thing well there's no excuse to not lose weight which is kind of always been there because you know just exercise just eat you know eat a balanced diet and you can lose weight which is which is bullshit because there are so many factors that influence our weight like I said the best predictor is your social class and status and the concern about that is it moves the conversation to being individuals choices and then it removes responsibility from governments and society to create environments that allow for well-being

that allow for health. But also, some people are going to be fat, irrespective of what they eat and what they do. Fat people have been around throughout history. You can't eliminate fat people. And so it perpetuates what we have weight bias and fat phobia in society by positioning this as a solution.

Also, I would just get people, people to reflect on. We've seen this before. We've seen celebrities and influences, particularly women, talk about various weight loss and diet programs in the past and the success of them, etc. And then it passes and then they regain the weight. And again, I have empathy for the, because especially women in a spotlight are under extra scrutiny for their appearance. So I understand that. But also what I think is problematic we're seeing. dialogues about people saying, oh, they've lost weight, but I didn't use a Zempick or I didn't use a weight loss injectable and as though therefore they are somehow superior or how dare you

critiqued the hard work that's gone into me losing weight. This is all problematic as well. This is because, again, there's a scrutiny in public dialogue about bodies and particularly women's bodies. And also this obsession with weight loss and the idea that you have to lose weight to be healthy, that weight loss is unequivocally going to improve your health, but that is the goal that we should all be aspiring to. But actually, you know, there are very few, well, if any, methods of weight loss that are effective in the long term, most people regain. And there are a lot of problems and harmful side effects of weight loss techniques and strategies. And sometimes I wonder if we just focused on a more what we call weight inclusive approach,

which is focusing on health and well-being and quality of life for everyone, irrespective of their weight and health, that could be a more positive way forward because you're still encouraging people to have a connection to their body, to respect their bodies, look after their bodies, but we're also creating an environment that allows everyone to be in their natural bodies without interfering through weight loss interventions and diet culture. it does feel unfortunately like thin is back in i wonder if you see this as somewhat of an inevitable

backlash to body positivity and how big body positivity became and i wonder and this analogy doesn't reflect my own views but i wonder whether you think society there's this general feeling within society that the pendulum swung too far with the body positivity movement in terms of accepting larger bodies and embracing larger bodies. Do you think that's what's happened and the pendulum always swings back and that's what's happened here? I think if we zoom out a little bit, there can be a tendency if we want to explain trends or what's happening at the moment to focus onto the immediate trend before. But I think if we zoom out and look across decades and perhaps even centuries, there have always been trends around beauty and appearance and fashion.

And this is amplified if you live in a capitalist society where people are selling products, services to appeal to trends and this idea, selling something new drives up desire. So I think it's probably a combination. I think we see trends in what's appealing for body sizes and shapes. they evolve throughout centuries, you know, if you think about Victorian women, to have like, you know, a bustle and to really exaggerate, you know, your butt so it looked massive, but to have a very narrow waist. That changed to more curvy figures at different points in time.

So beauty ideals and trends change throughout history. They change between cultures as well. So I think there's an element of that. And also, how do you get someone to talk about you, particularly if you're a celebrity that's known for that your body, how do you get press and attention? Well, I can change my body and probably do it in a really extreme way

so that I can get, you know, I will get attention and also be at the cutting edge of a new trend and set the trend. And then I probably have a range of products and things that you can buy to help you with that. So I think there's an element of that.

I think as well, there's still fat phobia, a lot of fat phobia and also with new quick fix. And also we can't not acknowledge the role of public health and government campaigns around obesity. And that's a word that I use because people, lots of people understand what that means, but around weight and health. So people have, it's really challenging to work out what is a healthy weight. What is a healthy way to be in your body? So I think you've got all that going alongside of it. One of the questions I've always been asked throughout my whole career,

my PhD looked at body size diversity in advertising. And back then it was like using plus size models, as they were called, which back in 2006, hardly any companies or brands were doing. And one of the most common questions I got asked from journalists, but also other health professionals, and I still get asked this all the time at conferences, if you move out of the body image space and eating disorder space, aren't you worried that by promoting positive body image, you're promoting obesity? And I feel like there's so many assumptions because then, you know, you're assuming that I think being in a larger body is a problem, which I don't necessarily. Our relationship, you know, our health and the relationship with weight is so much more complex than

just a number. But also, you're disreservation. regarding all the evidence which shows that actually when people have positive body image and by that I mean accepting their bodies for the most part, not every single day and every single aspect of your body, respecting your body and taking steps to try and protect yourself in your body by, for example, unfollowing problematic social media accounts listening to podcasts like this. That's positive body image and all the research, decades of research shows if you have positive body image, you're much more likely to have better mental health and well-being. Your weight is much likely to be stabilized because you're not dieting and yo-yoing.

You're much more likely to move your body, eat fruits and vegetables, go to the doctor, go for preventive health check-up appointments, to socialise, to have better relationships and better have better well-being in general. So there's all of those things happening at the same time. beauty norms, ideas about health industries profiting off this as well. You mentioned 2006. We have explored a lot of our childhood and the noise that's surrounded it, the media, what we deem to be entertainment.

And I personally find it a very interesting indicator of what we are like as a society. I think we can be judged quite heavily on what we deem entertaining. And I've had to do quite a lot of unpicking within myself. of my own internalised misogyny, of fat phobia, of whatever was instilled in me by the poison that I was reading as a child. During a really formative time, I was exposed to what I now look back on and see as like horrific journalism. When we explore this within ourselves as individuals who experienced this, how much do you think we need to take blame and responsibility for what we consume for the enjoyment that we derived and and how much of it can we go oh poor us like we

were totally immersed in this and like how crazy that is how much of that do you think is public versus so as sort of individual responsibility versus collective one of my favorite things is the idea dialectical thinking that two things can be true at once and I think as human beings we're complex and nuanced and we can often hold conflicting beliefs and we can be a product of the environment that we live in, but also we have some autonomy. So I think it's both. I think, yeah, if I look back at the same thing when I was growing up in Australia,

just the magazines, just the casual misogyny and sexism on TV, the objectification and sexualization of women, horrific. Even like I remember, I've talked about my friends recently, stuff that we were watching in our early 20s. At that point, I'm studying psychology and doing a thesis on body image. And yet still, you know, it's really hard to unravel. So this idea that we have to be critical consumers

and it's our responsibility assumes that we have the capacity and the education and the skills to start deconstructing. restructing all this noise around us. So that requires quite a lot of effort. And back when we were growing up, there weren't body image workshops and schools. There wasn't social media and a body positive movement. So how are you going to get those messages?

We had mainstream media, which is there are a lot of problems with social media. But I think sometimes we can forget the brilliance of it, which has been that it's opened up conversations. It's allowed us to find people who look like us, irrespective of what you look like, to find different communities. So back then, I think it's tricky. It depends on your circumstances and what access you had to role models or people who might challenge your thinking. Because I know where I grew up by the beach in Australia, there weren't many conversations happening like that in the media.

I did a presentation on sexism and objectification in the fashion industry in year 10. But that was quite revolutionary. The magazines were just starting to talk about this topic of like thin models. How was I meant to do that? And also you're getting very real rewards for conforming to that. Now it's different. I think with the internet we have access to lots more information and knowledge. So if you are able to digest that and you have access.

access. It becomes harder to justify why I will double down on my beliefs. So I think there is more out there. It's not available though for everyone in an accessible way. There's also a lot of privilege associated with having the time and energy to go and read and digest information to go to therapy and all of those types of things. And also there are massive industries and people benefiting from this and have done for many years. So why should, this is actually one of the things that got me to think about my PhD thesis. Why should young people and women have to learn how to unpack all of this and resist it? Why should we? Think about the energy that takes to actively be going through life trying to fight back against this. I'd prefer to spend my time,

energy thinking about other things. But it's like this double whammy you grew up with that. I've had to spend all this time and energy investing in my appearance or spending 250 quid on weight loss drugs every month. I've lost there. And then if I want to heal my own relationship with my body and think about my own interactions, I need to spend all this time healing my own relationship.

And it's like that is a huge tax on our mental energy, our money, our time, etc. And imagine if that wasn't there, how better that that is spent. Because even though we know from the research that people of all genders are affected by body image concerns and these issues that we're talking about, we know that still today, girls, women and gender diverse people are disproportionately affected. Boys and men are affected, absolutely. But if you only need to look at who are the consumers of cosmetic surgery? 90% of them are women.

If you look at weight loss fads and things in the past, it's often. often women. So you're getting taxed on multiple fronts for this. And I'm sorry, but it's not like if there's a gendered nature to consume as an agended way in which is this is presented. It's a gender equality issue. It's a social justice issue. And the source of fixing those is not just within individuals. It's with societies. It's collective individuals. So the blame can't be on us to think, okay, well, you need to work out and think critically about what you're viewing or what you're consuming. You're the one who's making the decision to buy that drug because that assumes that we all have an individual choice that's not influenced by anything. But all of our

individual choices are constrained by the society in which we grow up in. Oh my God. That was so good. That'll do. I'm so good. What are your thoughts on the psychology behind? I mean, yeah, so we've got this like horrible, vicious cycle where whereby newspapers, if they didn't get clicks for articles about women's bodies and TV shows, if they didn't get the viewing figures for, you know, for shows about women's bodies, then they wouldn't do it, right? So it's all this like vicious cycle. But why? I'm wondering what the psychology is behind us being so desperate to consume this kind of content. Why was it so was it comforting to us? Is it comforting to us? What's the

psychology do you think behind it? I think um we haven't all internalized to an extent beauty ideals and weight bias and fat phobia even if like you know we've talked about I've shared my own experience. Alex you mentioned your own experience of you can do a lot of work and work in these spaces and talk about this stuff all the time but the pressures of are so strong, that if we're even thinking about or have considered, even if it's just for a fleeting thought, passing thought, engaging in this latest kind of trend, how is the everyday person going to deal with that? So they're very entrenched and very internalized. And so I think if you're not always, like we've kind of said, trying to think about these

things and process and critique and if it's just the norm to be seeing this content it's very easy to just passively consume it it's also kind of taxing to have to have the thoughts to be like I'm not going to agree with this or you know I'm not going to engage with it and historically there wasn't really an alternative now there is you can seek it out on social media and we have the power now to create ourselves which is fantastic the other, one of the other perks of social media that we can create our own content and present a different narrative. But I think it's tricky.

I think that burden on individuals, also there's a, depending sometimes, unfortunately, as human beings, we can get a sense of self-worth by putting others down. And there's a classic theory, it's called social comparison theory. It was a psychologist in the 1950s called Leon Festinger. this idea that as human beings we compare ourselves to other people to work out where we stand in life. We do this based on our appearance. We do this on how much we earn. We do this on how good our children are at the party, on what grades we get at school, how good we are at sport, where we are in our careers. We compare ourselves to others to benchmark. And if we compare ourselves

to others, particularly people who we think represent the gold standard for whatever it is. So in terms of appearance it might be a celebrity or a model and we can feel like we're better than them for some reason that can be a sense of self-worth so if they have flaws as well oh they've got cellulite or they've got that well they're not necessarily better than me they're just like me and that can be a sense of self-worth it's a bit of a false economy though because it's still feeding into the idea that my self-worth doesn't just come from me. It comes from external sources. So there's that aspect to it as well. Also, sometimes the way in which this stuff, this content is produced and created and curated is very emotive and drama-filled

and sensational. And that's titillating for some people. Love that. Love that bit about the social comparison. I think that's a huge part of it. It's also. a sense of, you know, we are feeling, it's a bit like, you know, misery loves company, right? We're feeling these intense pressures. It's good to know that other people are as well, are subject to these intense pressures. It's not just me. Everyone else is being judged as harshly as I perceive myself to be judged. And so that as well, when we make these comparisons and we feel better about, like, we're

better off than something. That's called a downward comparison. There's also a phenomenon called assimilation where we feel similar to those people. and that can either have a neutral effect or sometimes can have a positive effect because they're just like me, so I'm kind of related to them and then, you know, that can feel good as well. Also, I think there can be a tendency if someone's glorified. It depends culturally, but I think this is the case definitely in Australia when I was growing

up and it is an extent here in the UK that particularly for women, I'm not saying this is just women doing it to other women because I also hate that narrative that women are our own worse critics, but this idea that if someone's really successful, we can want to find their flaws as a way to bring them back down to earth. Tall poppy syndrome. Yeah, exactly that. The worst is the reason I hate us the most. Whenever I see anyone doing this, I just, I hate it.

I think because it's like I was saying before about my own childhood, it was something I did derive something from pulling, even in my own head. I don't think I ever said anything out loud, but that's what I would do when I would read the... Well, my question to you is then, I wonder, and I've only just thought about this as you're talking, perhaps we were just desperate to be like, actually, these aren't real, that even the models and celebrities don't look like that. So look at them without makeup, look at them on the beach. There's almost like a desperation there to be like, see, they're not even like that. Yeah, yeah.

I don't know. Maybe there was something going on there subconsciously for women. There's a relief effect there. hey, they've got that as well. There's another point about being slightly gleeful about it or whatever, but maybe there was a fascination as well with being like, it was hard to look away because, oh my God, there is something going on behind that veneer that we're being sold.

I don't know. For anyone struggling with body image, it's incredible to get therapy and it's so beneficial and helpful, but it's not financially viable for a lot of people. If it isn't, and for people listening, if it isn't financially viable, what else can people do to feel better about their body, what the first steps they can take and where can they go from here? Yeah.

One really simple kind of thing that I recommend to women is to start to think about your body, not just as the shell to be looked at. Think about all of the things your bodies do on an everyday basis, many of them without us thinking, like we're sitting here having this conversation. right now our bodies are digesting food they're breathing blood is circulating um all sorts of different things are happening in our bodies we're probably fighting off colds and various things fatigue etc also our bodies allow us to move through life i got on the train from bristol came to london to have this conversation with you it moves me through the world your arms allow you to pick up

your children and hug them our brains allow us to create amazing podcast media to have conversations our bodies are these very complex tools and instruments and I would love and invite people women to start thinking about their bodies as tools and instruments that they can use rather than them just being something there to dress up or to be there for other people to respond to and one of the really great ways that you can start to do this is really simple you can do this on your phone in the notes up you could voice record yourself if you like to journal is to spend 10 minutes three times during a week. So you might want to do it on a Sunday,

do it on a Wednesday, and then maybe at the end of the week, and just spend 10 minutes free journaling what you're grateful for that your body allows you to do. Don't overthink it and think about whether it's senses. So it could be, you know, I'm a big foodie. So I love that, you know, I'm grateful for my taste buds that they allow me to have this food.

I'm really grateful for my brain because I do research and science and I have a really interesting job and it serves me well. I love to travel. I'm grateful for my body that puts up with different time zones and my circadian rhythm eventually adapts. So writing down all of those things, it will feel tricky at the start because we don't, you know, we don't flex that muscle very often. But the research shows, and my colleague, Dr. Jessica Reliever, has done lots of research on this, shows that just doing this for 10 minutes a day, three times over a week, boosts body confidence.

It improves body image. It also improves our idea about the complexity of our bodies. If we start to see our bodies as complex with all these different functions, we can have greater appreciation for them. So focusing on body functionality and gratitude. And then if you start to notice yourself, have negative feelings about your body, like the thoughts that many of us have,

if you can start to catch them, just notice them to begin with. And then if you notice that, try practicing saying something you're grateful for that your body allows you to do as an immediate response. So that's a little thing that you can do. I think there are people on social media who share advice and tips on body image that can be really helpful and make it more accessible. What I would say to people is to be careful about who you follow and to think about who's giving you advice. Anyone's giving you advice about eating and about

health and about diet and exercise. If they don't have qualifications, be very careful about the information that you're consuming. But we also know that following diverse people on social media is really beneficial for body image. So diversifying your feed and unfollowing people that don't make you feel great. There are some books and podcasts like you're listening to one now, but there are lots of free resources out there that you can also access. have conversations with your friends, not about how terrible everyone feels about their bodies, but like, where did this come from?

Like, why do you think we spend time thinking about this or set up body talk free zones and just create that little bit of space? If you have children, there are some really great, unfortunately, there are loads of resources available for young people now for free and parents to help their kids. Very few for adults and women themselves. which is something that I'm working on addressing at the moment.

But if you're a parent, not only just a parent, if you're an aunt or an uncle or you have a young person in your life, you're a teacher, there's some really great free resources available that will help guide those conversations with you. One, there's called the Confidence Kit, which my team and I at the Centre for Appearance Research worked on with Dove, it's freely available online. But the reason I suggest that because by having those conversations,

you'll start to reflect on things yourselves. And there's some really interesting research which shows that when people use body image tools like this with the young people in their lives, it's beneficial for their own body image as well. I wish I had more tools and resources to be able to share. But I think that really speaks to the issue that we need greater investment in this topic and greater investment in creating like scientifically bat tools that work for women. We can't just focus on young people. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. That was amazing. Amazing. Should I delete that as part of the ACAST creator network?