Gender, Core Self-Evaluations and Fear of Fatness among University Students in Ogun State, Nigeria

Aim: Empirical evidence suggests the existence of individual differences in people’s susceptibility to fear of fatness, usually occasioned by the increasingly pervasive norms in many parts of the world in which slimness is associated with health, beauty, intelligence and self-discipline; while fatness is associated with ugliness, lack of self-control, social irresponsibility, and laziness. This line of research, however, has not received adequate attention in Nigeria, thus limiting the prospects for better understanding of the problem as well as prevention and amelioration. This study investigated fear of fatness among randomly selected undergraduate students of a Nigerian university and the influence of personality (core self-evaluations), gender, age, and level of study on fear of fatness.
Methods: A multi-stage sampling technique was used to select 790 undergraduate students of Olabisi Onabanjo University, Ago-Iwoye, Nigeria. Participants were personally interviewed, using a standardized and psychometrically-robust questionnaire. Participants’ mean age was 22.10 (SD = 5.19). Out of the 790 participants, 490 (62.02%) were females and 300 (37.97%) were males.
Results: The mean score for males on the fear of fatness was 19.10 (SD = 7.22) while the mean score for females was 35.17 (SD = 8.32). Results of the 2x2 ANOVA indicated that persons with high CSEs had significantly lower fear of fatness scores than low CSEs persons {F (1,785) = 15.55; p. <.001}. Females scored significantly higher on fear of fatness than males {F (1,785) = 20.77; p. <.001}.
Conclusions/Recommendation: Fear of fatness is very high among university students in Nigeria, with CSEs, gender, age and level of study playing important roles. It is recommended that CSEs should be factored into relevant intervention programmes, such as counselling and psycho-education, for university students with a view to educating students on self-acceptance and CSEs to help them develop more realistic perceptions of themselves and their social worlds.