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UNT researchers to study body image of male collegiate athletes
DENTON (UNT), Texas -- In a recent episode of the popular series Glee, a male member of the New Directions of McKinley High School, who is often seen pumping iron, tells another male member that he hates himself for days if he misses a workout, or even eats a hot dog. And the student, a football player who seems to have an ideal body, feels insecure about appearing shirtless in a New Directions production of The Rocky Horror Picture Show. Because training in sport environments that emphasize leanness, muscularity and body shape may damage male athletes' body image and self-concept, a University of North Texas doctoral student in psychology plans to research body image of male collegiate athletes competing in NCAA Divisions I, II and III, including their rates of eating disorders and other weight control behaviors. Justine Chatterton and her major professor, Dr. Trent Petrie, received a $16,931.90 grant from the NCAA for the study. They plan to recruit at least 1,000 male collegiate athletes from across the nation for the study, with the athletes completing an online questionnaire about pressures they receive from coaches, teammates and others, and about behaviors they engage in that are symptoms of, or may lead to, disordered eating. Chatterton, a second-year student in UNT's doctoral program in counseling psychology, is a consultant in the university's Center for Sport Psychology and Performance Excellence, which is directed by Petrie. As a consultant, she works with individual athletes, coaches and sports teams in the Dallas-Fort area, helping them develop mental skills and strategies aimed at achieving certain goals and levels of performance excellence. She said she decided to research body image of male collegiate athletes after another consultant in the center, Carlin Anderson, received a grant from the NCAA to study body image of female collegiate swimmers, divers and gymnasts. Anderson, a 2009 graduate of UNT who is now a licensed psychologist at a clinic in Minnesota, determined that the more that the female athletes agreed with society's ideals concerning beauty, appearance and body size and shape for women, the less satisfied they were with the size and shape of their own bodies -- even though past research has indicated that athletes generally report greater satisfaction with their bodies than nonathletes. Anderson also discovered that the female athletes who were not satisfied with their bodies reported more feelings of anger, sadness and fear, and the extent to which they felt pressure from coaches and teammates about weight and appearance was strongly linked to bulimia and other restrictive eating behaviors in the athletes. Chatterton notes that while many other studies on female athletes have been conducted in the past, few have focused on male athletes using a large, national sample that represents different sports. She says she wants to discover if male college athletes respond similarly to pressure from coaches and teammates about weight and appearance. "They may not be driven to diet and lose weight to achieve an ideal body type, but the males may be driven to increase their lean, muscular body mass. While they may not experience traditional eating disorders, they may be engaging in other unhealthy behaviors," she says. The male athletes will be asked about past injuries that put them on the sidelines to determine if lack of playing time led to disordered eating or unhealthy behaviors, how long the athletes have been playing their sport and if they have partial or full scholarships. Petrie notes that athletes who do have full scholarships "tend to be higher level competitors" and may eventually play their sport professionally. The athletes' long-term goals in their sports, he says, may or may not contribute to how they view their bodies and their actions toward their bodies. "In some sports, there's not as much pressure to achieve a certain body type. Football players range from 300-pound linemen to quarterbacks, running backs and other players who have more lean bodies," he says. "However, swimmers, runners and gymnasts probably have different body concerns than football players. We hope to have a large enough group of participants in the study to compare those in different sports." The researchers will collect data from those who respond to the online questionnaire for the next few months. They plan to have results from the study next May.
UNT News Service Phone Number: (940) 565-2108
Contact: Nancy Kolsti (940) 565-3509
Email: nkolsti@unt.edu
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