ArticleObesity science & practice2017
Overweight or about right? A norm comparison explanation of perceived weight status.
Article in Obesity science & practice, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 19 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
19 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Factors Influencing Parents' and Children's Misperception of Children's Weight Status: a Systematic Review of Current Research.Current obesity reports · 2019Pooled it
- Motivations for and experience with labor induction at 39 weeks in women with obesity-A qualitative study.Acta obstetricia et gynecologica Scandinavica · 2025Trial
- Influence of weight perception on the evolution of body composition of adolescents under obesity treatment.European journal of pediatrics · 2026Article
- Shape of You: Eye-Tracking and Social Perceptions of the Human Body.Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Article
- Challenges in identifying malnutrition in obesity; An overview of the state of the art and directions for future research.Nutrition research reviews · 2025Review
- Factors affecting weight management in overweight or obese diabetic patients: the 2018-2021 Korea national health and nutrition examination survey.Physical activity and nutrition · 2024Article
- Longitudinal evidence over 2 years of the pandemic shows that poor mental health in people living with obesity may be underestimated.PloS one · 2024Article
- Perception of body size and body dissatisfaction in adults.Scientific reports · 2022Article
- The Real Ideal: Misestimation of Body Mass Index.Frontiers in global women's health · 2022Article
- Use of a real-life practical context changes the relationship between implicit body representations and real body measurements.Scientific reports · 2021Article
- In the eye of the beholder: Body weight misperceptions among African Americans living in Kentucky.Journal of intercultural communication research · 2021Article
- The Perceived Match Between Observed and Own Bodies, but Not Its Accuracy, Is Influenced by Movement Dynamics and Clothing Cues.Frontiers in human neuroscience · 2021Article
- Self-perception of overweight and obesity: A review of mental and physical health outcomes.Obesity science & practice · 2020Review
- Perceived match between own and observed models' bodies: influence of face, viewpoints, and body size.Scientific reports · 2020Article
- Body Weight Misperception and Weight Disorders among Chinese Children and Adolescents: A Latent Class Analysis.Current medical science · 2019Article
- Enrolment of families with overweight children into a program aimed at reducing childhood obesity with and without a weight criterion: a natural experiment.BMC public health · 2019Article
- Visual body size norms and the under-detection of overweight and obesity.Obesity science & practice · 2018Article
- Overweight but unseen: a review of the underestimation of weight status and a visual normalization theory.Obesity reviews : an official journal of the International Association for the Study of Obesity · 2017Review
- Overweight or about right? A norm comparison explanation of perceived weight status.Obesity science & practice · 2017Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
2 authors.
Funding
Abstract
objectivesBody-weight norms may explain why personal evaluations of weight status are often inaccurate. Here, we tested a 'norm comparison' explanation of weight status perceptions, whereby personal evaluations of weight status are biased by perceived body-weight norms.
methodsStudy 1 examined whether perceptions of how one's own body weight compares to an average person predict personal evaluations of weight status. Study 2 examined whether manipulating perceptions of how one's own body weight compares to an average person influences whether or not a person identifies their own weight status as being overweight.
resultsIn Study 1, if participants rated their body weight as being similar to the body weight of an average person, they were less likely to identify their weight status as being overweight. In Study 2, participants that were led to believe that their body weight was heavier than the average person were more likely to perceive their own weight status as being overweight.
conclusionsPersonal perceptions of weight status are likely to be shaped by a 'norm comparison' process. As overweight becomes more normal, underestimation of weight status amongst individuals with overweight and obesity will be more common.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.